Each year, on 1 December the World AIDS Day calls for more awareness and action with regard to the global HIV/AIDS pandemic. This year a group of voluntary organisers, among them the Peace Institute’s researchers Petra Granholm and Sarah Stephan, has seized the opportunity to put HIV/AIDS on the agenda and invited the public to a World AIDS Day Music Café at Röda korsgården.The idea behind the event was to raise awareness about HIV/AIDS and provide a forum for the Ålanders to ask and discuss questions about the disease. At the same time the Music Café was a fund-raising event for the women’s group and nursery school “Kanyala Little Stars” on Rusinga Island in Kenya, an area that suffers immensely under the effects of HIV/AIDS.The evening was opened with a short seminar, held by chief medical officer Birger Sandell, on the infection, treatment and prevention of HIV/AIDS. The initiator of the event Heidi Öst informed about her experiences as a volunteer at Kanyala Little Stars and her wish to support the project from the Åland Islands. The performances of the Ålandic folkmusic group “Kvinnfolk”, ”Hmpf…” and Ann Ahlström and Christopher Isaksson completed the successful evening.The Café was a great success as it triggered fruitful discussions in a relaxed atmosphere. The selling of coffee and home-baked cake as well as the selling of red-ribbons and bracelets has raised more than 400 € for Kanyala Little Stars.
