So this post is going to be a quick one because I am in the middle of exams, ordered take out, and I’ve been wearing a hoodie which basically means my life is a wreck. This past Saturday I had the honor of speaking at the Roots & Shoots Celebration of Service at NYU. It was awesome to speak about Campamento Ezperanzo y Alegria and raise money to send kids to camp selling Esmeralda’s Hope bracelets.

While I was there to speak and share my story of service it was one little kid who totally made my day. I was speaking about a camp for HIV+ children so obviously the AIDS topic was broached. Whenever I speak about AIDS I am speaking specifically about mother-to-child transmission so a sex talk isn’t necessary. Now, I had my first sex talk at 9 so I’d be totally chill with educating the youngsters but their parents probably wouldn’t be down.

After speaking I checked out some of the kids projects which were on display. A dapper young 7th grader, very small for his age and in a blazer, pulled me aside and gave me a 10 minute presentation on the 3 (THREE) projects he was working on with his teacher who had brought him – she watched proudly. I was blown away. He was doing insanely great work and his presentation skills put me to shame.

When he was done he asked me how HIV is transmitted. I decided to bypass the sex talk and gave a general “transmission of body fluids” explanation. He asked if that included blood transfusions. I said yes, tainted blood transfusions are a major transmitter of HIV. Boy breaks out with how he has had THIRTY SEVEN BLOOD TRANSFUSIONS!!! WTF!!!! Turns out he had leukemia as a ‘kid’ – as if he isn’t still a kid.

So this kid is a kickass, leukemia-beating, presentation-beasting, sustainability-advocating superhero.

Kids going places.