South Africa / 2010 / 23mins / Audio Recording / English

Thembi Ngubane carried a tape recorder from 2004 to 2005 to document her life. She was willing to talk about living with AIDS at a time no one did. Her story aired on National Public Radio in the U.S., and in the U.K., Australia and Canada, reaching more than 50 million people.

Thembi Ngubane

Thembi Ngubane, an HIV/AIDS activist from South Africa, was 19 years old when she began using a tape recorder to make an audio diary of her struggle to live with AIDS. For more than a year, Thembi captured the small moments of her life that helped tell a larger story: her first conversation with her mother about AIDS; a visit to the township clinic to apply for life-saving drugs; facing neighbors and friends as they slowly learn her status; a moment of quiet, late-night dancing at home with her boyfriend. Thembi courageously presented her story in high schools, colleges, and clinics in the U.S. and South Africa and spoke in front of the South African Parliament about HIV/AIDS and her experience. She passed away from tuberculosis at the age of 24 in 2009. Learn More