He went on peeling his vegetables all the time I was talking to Christine. Occasionally some child or perhaps his wife or one of the other women would give him something to drink.

He was like a measurer of time who would reject a normal clock with scorn. For him, a better way of measuring progress in his life and that of others was peeling vegetables.

Christine was thin and tired. I could see at once that she had put herself out in anticipation of our meeting. Her choice of clothes, her face carefully made-up, her meticulously brushed hair. She was typical of all the people suffering from Aids whom I met during my visit to Uganda: the last thing they were forced to surrender was their dignity. That was the ditch that had to be defended at all costs: after that there was nothing but death, and it often struck quickly once their dignity had been lost.

Christine said:"I have a daughter."

We were sitting on two brown stools behind the open but covered room which the family used to prepare food. Christine said something in her native tongue. Her daughter emerged from a clump of banana trees. She was wearing a dark blue skirt, which was ragged and torn, a red blouse, and she was barefooted. She was slim and tall and took after her mother: they had the same features around their mouths and noses and eyes. Aida was shy, she spoke in a low voice and her eyes were cast down. When I shook her hand, she withdrew it as quickly as she could.

Aida was nowhere to be seen for the rest of my long conversation with her mother. It was almost afternoon, when we had to leave to drive back to Kampala and had other appointments, before I saw Aida again. She was with Christine's mother and some of the other girls, not Christine's daughters but the daughters of her sister. One sister had already died of Aids. They were preparing dinner. I watched Aida fetch the vegetables that Christine's father had been peeling all day.