Here at the AIDS Conference, with sessions for more than 20,000 people, attendees have to choose their time wisely. I find myself often wishing that I could be in two places at once, and struggling to decide whether I should go to the sessions on topics I know nothing about, or those that I’ve already got an interest in. Should I go for the big names or the niche experts or the hands-on activists? In keeping with the dominant theme at the conference, I’m taking a combination approach.

Monday started with the big names, including a session with Bill Clinton, full of metaphors about us foot soldiers having to slay the dragon of AIDS in the absence of a Saint George equivalent. Those who know me will understand that I like anyone who makes a Saint analogy. The content was fairly rhetorical, and could have all been found on the Clinton Foundation website. In the stereotypical American way the former president ended his speech with a “God Bless You!”

In the afternoon there was a great session called “Reaching Millions: HIV, Youth and the Digital Age”. The head of Voxiva spoke about a project in Rwanda called TracNet that helps the Ministry of health use mobile phones to collect data on ARV roll-out and a new partnership with Carso Institute in Mexico to support people living with HIV/AIDS using mobile phones (for example, daily dose reminders). TakingITGlobal (who does the Youth Force site for the conference) and the Global Youth Coalition HIV/AIDS spoke about their social networks that connect and provide information for young activists. A young woman called Thembi from Cape Town presented clips from her audio journal that track her journey through AIDS diagnosis and living positively which are available at www.aidsdiary.org. We also heard from Punto J, a dynamic site in South America to help youth access info about HIV/AIDS and sexuality, with lots of comics, etc. Finally, loveLife from South Africa’s new mobile phone project (very low bandwidth) was presented as an alternative to web-based engagement in the face of SA’s high mobile phone use among youth (74 percent own a mobile) versus internet (6 percent of youth access the internet regularly).

On a personal level, attendance at this conference is like stumbling upon that perfect article for your research that you didn’t even know you needed, but making the transition from learning to action is the hard part. I keep on thinking, “What now, what next?”

(I have been recording most sessions so I will have audio files if anyone wants them)