Hey Yall! What's Shakin?!

Hello and welcome to the Coco Eskimo Blog. My name is Rozita and I'm just one woman, wife and mother who wants to help make a difference with this HIV/AIDS epidemic that we're faced with today. I truely believe that with your help, we can make a difference.

A couple of years ago while living in Birmingham, Alabama I was introduced to an organization called AIDS Alabama. With them I did a lot of volunteer work throughout the community and the people that I had the opportunity to meet and work with were impressive to say the very least. I trained to become a Peer Educator with this organization and was trained also to administer the HIV tests, but I never tested anyone myself  because I really didn't feel like I could handle it if I ever had to tell someone that they had tested positive. Cause you see, while working a health fair event one afternoon I witnessed a young man who had been told the news of having just tested positive and something inside of me felt hurt and broken for him. Because he was only 19 years old! He was still just a baby, I mean I have a son his age! I think about this kid a lot and I remember the tears all over his face and I hope that he's doing alright.

So for the time being I'm going to stick to educating people and helping to prevent someone else from getting infected. Because I prefer tears of joy.

I named my Blog after a very dear friend that I crossed paths with while living in Alabama. Because this cat (I'll call him Drew), was a trip! He was always telling me how much he liked my clothes and that when I got tired of wearing anything to let him have it. lol Well one night when I saw him it was pretty cold outside and he was wearing this big fluffy white jacket. It was sharp! The jacket had white furry trim all around the hood!! And before I knew it I told him that he looked like a damn Chocolate Eskimo! We laughed so hard! So the name stuck and it was his nickname from then on. But since moving a couple of years ago I lost contact with Drew, but I think of him all the time and I'm so glad that he came into my life. I miss my Chocolate Eskimo.

In a couple of months I'm planning to host a small and informal event where some of the ladies will come together and have a discussion about HIV/AIDS in our community. It will be the first of many and the way that I intend to fund these events is to use the proceeds from t-shirt sales and HotChicJewelry.com, which is my homebased business.

Please keep in  mind that this is my first Blog and I will be learning as I go and I am open to suggestions. PLEASE also remember to always be respectful of others here on Coco Eskimo, because this issue is a very emotional one.

Thanks for stopping by and I'm looking forward to doing this blog thang with you!

My Clinic Closes at 11:45 on Fridays!

Okey, so today I rushed over to the clinic to get some information on HIV/AIDS to share with my family and friends. And I get there to find that they are closed! I was like, OMG are you kidding me?! The poor guy at the desk looked at me like I was nuts. But I guess who ever walks in there insisting on seeing someone in the HIV/AIDS clinic, right? It wouldn't have been so bad if there had been some information available in the lobby. But there was ONE brochure and it was on siphillis. Oh Lord! All I could think about was bless the one who gets up the nerve to come in here today. How long will it take for them to get the courage to make another trip because every 9 minutes...someone is infected with the HIV virus..right here in the US of A!!

I'm going back when they open at 8:30 Monday morning and I hope that whoever else missed them today will commit to doing the same.