HIV Awareness raising in prisons and communities

About a year ago we introduced Kain to you, a father of two and sentenced to 25 years in prison. He was suspected of drug trafficking and put in Thailand's most notorious prison: Bangkwan. This was last year. But then this year a miracle happened. And then Kain messed it up again. This is a story of failing and keeping on fighting.

One of Siam-Care's staff visited Kain every week. His family lived far away and was not able to visit him. They asked Siam-Care to visit Kain, buy him food, and check how he was doing. Our staff has done this for almost a year. And then suddenly, a very unexpected thing happened. Kain was released. We are not sure if he bribed his way out or if he was really found not guilty. It didn't really matter, we were happy for Kain that he could see his family again. But before Kain had the chance to hug his children, he messed up again.

Sold drugs again
One of Kain's old friends contacted him and convinced him to sell a small ammount of XTC. Kain first refused but then realized he needed the money. So, he said yes and was arrested during the handing over of the drugs. He believes his old friend set him up and contacted the police. We are not sure anymore what to believe, but it is quite a drama.

Did not learn from previous mistakes
We want the best for everybody we work with, also for Kain. Even when people make stupid decisions, we value them. But of course, we are dissapointed that Kain did not take better decisions. We hoped he learned from what had already happened to him, he should have known better. Unfortunately, he made the same old mistake and now has to pay with a long time in prison, far away from his family.

Keep on fighting
We will probably keep on visiting him. Maybe not every week, but once a month perhaps. Kain is a broken man who made very poor choices himself, for sure. And yet we believe that God loves him and cares for him. Some people we visit in prison have made one mistake, forced by poverty. Others have messed up many times. Both people are not perfect. Both people deserve to be in prison. Both people deserve to be loved. Thank you for allowing us to reach out to people like Kain. It is a very challenging job and sometimes we are so angry we want to run away and never deal with people like Kain again. But we will keep on fighting. For him. And for his family.

In these GlobalGiving reports, we always try to share an exciting story about the impact our program has on prisoners. Sometimes lifes are being impacted by our training and counselling. Sometimes not much special happends, like last visit. We'd like to share a little bit about what a regular training session in prison looks like.

Our staff in Bangkok visits the youthprison in Nakhom Pathom about 2 times a month. Usually we bring 3 of 4 staff to train the youngsters in prison. Many of them have been arrested because of drugs-related crimes. Drugdealing is severely punished in Thailand, but because these boys are younger than 18, they usually get a lower sentence, like 2 or 3 years imprisonment. This week, the group consists of 60 people, all boys, all between 15 and 18 years old.

Ice-breaker
We always start with introducing ourselves. Eventhough these kids all did something illegal, they are all very polite boys and always great us with a smile and a wai (a Thai way of greeting). After the introducting, we always do an icebreaker: a little game to lower the tension. Sometimes we play a game, sometimes we sing a song, but the boys always join enthousiastically. This time we play a Thai version of "Simon says", a little game where the boys have to follow the moves of on of our staff.

What is HIV?
Then the training: in Thailand the highest risk group of getting HIV-infected, are teenagers. They start to become sexually active and often don't have knowledge on safe sex and sexual transmitted diseases. Most school in Thailand don't teach about sex at all; hence a lot of these boys don't know what HIV is. In about 45 minutes, our staff teaches the boys about HIV, condoms, pregnancies and other sex related subjects. Most boys are surprisingly open and often ask questions.

Fight HIV in every possible way
Siam-Care works with people who are touched by HIV/Aids. We guide people in their medication-use, we give job-trainings and give scholarships. But to prevent is better than to cure. So we try to inform as many youngsters as we can, about the risks of unsafe sex. We fight HIV in every possible way and dream of a Thailand which will one day be HIV-free. Because of your support, we can train prisoners and others and protect them. Thank you for making our prison program possible!