The documentary film Umoyo (Life) follows three Canadian teens on a journey to Africa to stay with young Zambian women at the Umoyo School for Girls. In the film, the girls explore issues of sexual power and the feminization of AIDS. In Zambia, a teenage girl is five times more likely to be HIV-positive than a teenage boy. The film sheds disturbing light on the reasons behind this startling statistic.

The film is part of a larger campaign, A Mile in Her Shoes, to mobilize young women, both figuratively and literally, to join in the fight against AIDS. In the spring of 2007, the Canadian girls involved in Umoyo (Life) will travel to schools and community centres across Canada, screening the documentary and launching a series of fund-raising walks grounded in the concept of A Mile in Her Shoes: how many miles does she walk to get to school? to access safe drinking water? health care?... Pledge amounts will be contextualized to create a more meaningful experience: for instance, $4/mile provides prevention of mother-to-child transmission, $10, a cure for TB, $30, school fees for a year. Funds raised will go to the Stephen Lewis Foundation.

The Canadian girls will leave in their wake A Mile in Her Shoes student and community groups, equipped with DVD's, a resource binder and pledge forms. The binder will provide some of the most current and compelling material on the feminization of AIDS, along with practical guidance for organizing future Umoyo (Life) screenings and Mile in Her Shoes walks, creating sustained awareness and financial support for programs helping HIV/AIDS-affected women and girls.

About Umoyo

The Umoyo School for Girls is the best example of girl's empowerment I've seen in many a year in Africa. It has about 50 girls, ranging in age from 14 to 18, all of them orphans, all of them democratically chosen by their communities. They come together in this residential setting for a year, and emerge from the desperate trauma of death and loss, fully self-confident, brimming with excitement about education and life, open and informed about the danger of HIV/AIDS and ready to tackle the world. They greeted my delegation with exultant singing (heavenly voices), and answered questions on everything from family history to future job prospects to their views on adolescent sexuality. It was exhilarating, beginning to end. - Stephen Lewis, UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS:

In 2006, during the filming, there were 63 girls at Umoyo. The girls began their day at 6:00 a.m., with a beautiful prayer session, followed by an exuberant run around the school grounds - a cluster of pristine white huts surrounded by corn fields and wildflowers. Then the serious business of the day began. Classes were intensely practical: the girls studied nutrition, budgeting, agriculture, sewing, cooking, hygiene, literacy, and HIV/AIDS prevention. In the first class our crew visited, students learned about female condoms, how to defend themselves from sexual assault, and how to deal with harassment from an employer. The director of the school, Mwamba Mutale, spent his youth living on the streets, and is under no illusions about the kinds of pressures and dangers these girls face, or the skills they need to survive once their year at Umoyo is over. The other important aspect of the program is the counseling, which takes place twice a week, in groups and individually. Many of the girls at Umoyo have lost their entire support networks: mother, father, sister, brother, friend. They have suffered not only the loss of loved ones, but in many cases, the trauma of rape, unwanted pregnancy, and the devastating news that they have contracted HIV/AIDS. Although not professional therapists, as we would expect in North America, the staff at Umoyo provide a life-line of care and support for these girls. At the end of the day, the girls have a chance to socialize, play sports, sing, dance, and, when night falls, to gather around the TV for some pre-bedtime entertainment.

Following their time at Umoyo, the girls go on what are called "attachments" - essentially month-long work placements - which are intended to help the girls secure employment once they graduate from the program.

Umoyo is one of several projects run by an umbrella organization called Kara Counseling, a local grassroots NGO, and according to the Globe and Mail's Africa correspondent, Stephanie Nolen, "one of the most effective organizations on the continent" providing education and support for people living with HIV/AIDS.