Babu on the Bad Road - The Best American Travel Writing 2013 - page 98

turns to me and says in English, “If you had come here first, there would be no problem, but
now, we have heard the word from Loliondo.” We say a hasty goodbye to Simon and make
the five-hour drive back to Arusha.
In 2006, Francis Tesha tested positive for HIV. He lived in Wasso, the outpost town where
Ambilikile Mwasapila had been a Lutheran pastor before his retirement. Francis was about
40, married, and had a job at a local hunting lodge partly owned by the royal family of Abu
Dhabi. His employers liked him so much that they brought him with them to Abu Dhabi to
work for months at a time. When they heard about his diagnosis, he was fired and sent back
to Wasso. His wife died a few months later—of malaria. Their neighbors believed the shock
weakened her and that she may have also had HIV, but she refused to be tested or take med-
ication.
Francis did accept ARV therapy and took the pills every day. He joined the HIV support
groupinWassoandbecameitssecretary.Hewasgregariousandwellliked.InOctober2010,
he heard reports of a healer in Samunge who could cure HIV. Although Francis felt healthy,
he figured if he killed the viruses in his body, he could be certified HIV negative, allowing
him to get his old job back. On October 2, he took a bus from Wasso to Samunge, drank the
liquid, and spoke with Mwasapila, who assured him that after 21 days, the virus would be
gone from his body. Francis returned to Wasso in high spirits, telling his friends at the HIV
support group that Babu could free them of the virus and the ARVs.
Francis stayed off the ARVs for three weeks as instructed, and then excitedly went to the
hospital for an HIV test. To his dismay, he was still HIV positive, and in fact, his CD4 count
had diminished. 4 He reluctantly began taking ARVs again, but now he felt much more vul-
nerable to side effects, becoming dizzy and nauseated when he took the drugs. To settle his
stomach, he occasionally skipped his ARVs. In February, he was hospitalized for a second-
ary infection and, when he got out a few days later, started saying he no longer believed in
Mwasapila'smedicine.HisneighborswhisperedthatFrancishadanewgirlfriendwithwhom
he had sex with no condom. Babu had cured him, they reasoned, but he allowed himself to
become reinfected.
Despite Francis Tesha's faint warnings, by February of last year, Babu was a national phe-
nomenon, and the BBC reported 6,000 people in line at his clinic. Unlike Francis, many
peoplereturnedfromLoliondowithpowerfultestimonials.Diabeticssworetheirbloodsugar
hadnormalizedandtheycoulddrinksodasandeatbreadagain.Stomachulcerssubsided,and
aches and pains vanished. Newspapers reported the woman Babu treated in 2009 was con-
firmed HIV negative, and people excitedly related stories of cousins or neighbors who were
cured of HIV/AIDS.
The Tanzanian government seemed internally conflicted about how to respond to Mwas-
apila. In March, the Ministry of Health announced they were ordering the healer to cease his