I had to stay in India.

MUMBAI, PUNE

A few hours after my HIV diagnosis in an Indian ashram, I knew; I had to stay in India. At least to finish what I came for. I knew I had time – I knew that whether I return to Vienna two weeks earlier or later wouldn’t matter anymore. I was HIV positive – and that would stay that way. The research helped, and so did my brother.

I had lost my bearing. I knew that boarding that flight back to Vienna would lead me directly into that abyss of the unknown. Into unprecedented darkness. My life ended from one day to the next, and all I could do was postpone that confrontation. With myself, but also my friends and family. How the hell will I tell them? And when? And how will they react? I would return to Vienna as a new person. My old life was gone. It was lost in India, never to return.

Not only that, but I had an obligation – Sarah, the journalist I was with, was a first timer to India. I wasn’t going to spoil that for her. I always envy the ones who arrive in India for the very first time. Its an exhilarating experience – a new world to be seen. Every time I arrive there, it has a similar feeling – but the first time is still something special. The smell of the thick, humid air. The chaotic traffic. The cows. Arriving in India for the first time is an assault of impressions that lasts forever.

Having just arrived, I simply couldn’t leave her there on her own. Not with the project at hand and the dangers involved. I’m not sure until this day whether it was a fake sense of obligation, simply to not confront myself with my own impending disaster. A way to distract myself from the fact that my life had changed forever. To still enjoy this old, adrenaline-junkie life of mine. To bid farewell.

So what I continued doing was the perfect distraction – to go on raids with Mumbais police force to document the horrors of forced prostitution in India.

I held up my end of the deal. And I think I did a good job of it. Despite the long nights of doubt and terror, the days and evenings were kept up in professional manner. I managed to keep a straight face in all the intense situations that would define the upcoming two weeks.

Visiting the shelters for the rescued sex workers, interviewing the Pune chief of police, entering the red light districts in their full horror. Being surrounded by the horny, testosterone filled masses of men waiting their turn in front of the brothels – giggly and curious about the two whites that had entered this forbidden kingdom.

Speaking to the drugged sexworkers in their cramped showrooms; they were slaves. Human sperm deposits on what seemed a construction belt. Being forced to take one man after the next. All day. All night. In her state of drug induced high, she spoke fairly good English. Explaining that she had done this for a while to keep her family financed, and obviously lying when stating she could leave whenever she wanted to. That she was treated well and wanted to do this.

We had entered a territory that wasn’t meant for our eyes, yet induced a curiosity in the masses of men on the streets below. And strangely, what seemed no hostility. A naïve curiosity – the indian stare. Although with the hundreds of men surrounding us, I felt at unease. I prepared for the worst. Gripping my tripod, I knew I had to stay alert. A thick tension hung in the air, and I felt that if hostility did ensue, I would have to keep my guard up. We were under protection, and yet my years of travelling had taught me to be prepared for whatever would happen. It would’ve been a hopeless fight – but at least I wouldn’t make an easy victim.

The streetwalkers had disappeared at our arrival. Observing us from afar, behind darkened windows in the run down houses lining the red light district of Pune.

Despite the intensity of the ventures into these areas, the strangest sensation came in the NGOs hospice. The countryside residence which we were allowed to visit, where the rescued girls received education and vocational training. Away from the cities; away from the pollution, noise and filth. In the tranquility of nature.

Naturally, all of them were psychologically scarred from their ordeals – only the hospice sheltered the ones that carried the physical consequences. They were HIV positive. And I was too. And I had just found out about myself a few days earlier.

With curious fascination I shot their portraits – “I am one of you…I have what you have… and nobody here has any idea…”. Secluded from the other girls, I already saw the physical boundaries that had been constructed. Although free to roam everywhere, they were kept away from the rest. I still don’t quite understand why they were kept separate.

Questions shot through my mind – what was it like to have this? They knew so much more about living with this virus than I did. They had so much more shit to process in their lives anyway. I felt I was looking into a distorted mirror of sorts. A future image of my own disease, right in front of me.

In the exhausted evenings I would return to my dreaded new state of mind – With the first big task at hand, concerning HIV. I had to start telling the three women I had slept with in the past months. Find out where it came from, and warn the ones I was with.

Not having internet in the Mumbai home, I now had to go to a cramped internet café with 90s computers and a barely functioning ceiling fan.