Hello everyone! I’m so excited to be able to be a part of this blog and share all of my passionate experiences with all of you! For those of you who may not know of me, my name is Sasha, I’m a singer/ songwriter from Russia! I have been blessed to have a successful career for over a decade releasing successful albums, performing all over the world and starred/produced my very own show on MTV Russia for three seasons. I’m glad I can use globalgrind.com to contribute to a cause I’m passionate about, World AIDS awareness day which falls on December 1st every year.
We’re all aware of the AIDS epidemic. Many of us, however, think it exists in some parallel reality. If it doesn’t come our way, we tend to overlook it. I’ll admit it: I was like that.
Then, one day, I was online and a window popped up. Annoying…or so I thought. Normally, I –like most of us– close pop-ups immediately. This one was different….These big blue eyes stared straight at me. It was a 2-year-old boy named Alesha, and he was born HIV-positive. I kept clicking and reading more and more about the poor boy that could have had a chance, but didn’t.
You see , in Russia HIV/AIDS appeared much later than in Europe or the U.S but, currently the infection rates are twice as high as those in the U.S. for example. The major problem being lack of money and awareness. Back in the day in the Soviet Union, people with HIV/AIDS were going through hell while being alive! Not ONLY they had to deal with the disease and lack of proper medical care, but also society that judged and looked down upon them, essentially treating them as JUNK! Even the medical community should be more aware and tolerant.
Today things are improving. I recently learned about a movie series, “Fire,” that is coming out on a major Russian channel on December 1st ! This is the first Russian series of its kind, that reveals the sad, challenging realities of living with HIV/AIDS. Hopefully steps like this can HELP build awareness, and resolve the bigger cultural problem that exists in Russia: people do NOT trust charitable organizations! Don’t get me wrong, Russians are very compassionate. However, we as a country have faced so many struggles, due to financial and political changes that occurred over a very brief time span, that many people simply don’t believe that donated money will reach those who truly need them. This makes developing and running a successful charity organization fairly difficult and nearly impossible!
Charity is a beautiful aspect that American culture has. I hope, through the U.S. media and this blog in particular, I can import this ‘trend’ if you will into Russia, and hopefully make charity part of a cultural phenomenon there.
I feel like not only in Russia but also globally much more effort could be and should be put into this issue! To help one Alesha simply isn’t enough. My goal is to spread HIV/AIDS awareness as far and wide as I can. This is a reality that we absolutely can’t ignore! Let’s not only talk about it, let’s scream about it. Together, our voices can truly make a difference!!!
Peace and Love,
Sasha
http://www.myspace.com/sashanow
http://www.twitter.com/sashanow
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