One bright morning we drive with Youth Vision colleagues to the town of Kafue, about 45 minutes east of Lusaka, where major textile and chemical factories closed years ago. Unemployment is staggeringly high and, given the main trucking route slicing through Kafue’s neighborhoods, commercial sex is common – as is gender-based violence.

We’re meeting with community-based peer educators of the “Love Support” HIV prevention outreach program that Youth Vision runs with support from RFSU, the Swedish Association for Sexuality Education. As our group walks around the troubled community, we pass several “pubs” blaring music so loud the distortion hurts. Handmade banners that advertise traditional healers, one with a bizarre illustration of a couple inside a cauldron over an open fire, are prominent.

I’m walking with Emily, a friendly peer educator in her late teens or early 20’s, who tells me there are far more pubs than schools. Young men linger about, some with drinks in hand, others playing on foosball machines. We duck inside to see the “love jars” stocked with condoms, though at this time of day (mid-morning) they are empty and will be replenished in the afternoon in time for “rush hour” at the pubs. The peer educators report that demand for condoms is high.

“Once you graduate from school, you’ve no job prospects and nothing to do. To survive, many young girls turn to selling sex with truckers and men in the community,” Emily recounts. I ask her about her friends’ experiences, whether sexual violence, unplanned pregnancy and unsafe abortion are common occurrences within her circle. “Oh yes,” she says and proceeds to tell me of her 20-year old friend’s funeral just last week who died from an unsafe abortion. “We need more contraceptives, more respect between women and men, and good jobs after we graduate,” Emily continues. “Then my friends and I can have a better life.”

Check back tomorrow to read about our clinic visits in Zambia!