ELVIS Basudde is the first Ugandan journalist to go public about his HIV positive status.
Events that followed were stressful.

His uncle told him he was going to die, his wife walked out on him to get married to another man, Elvis could not walk and he was left to fight the stigma alone.
It all started with Elvis' decision to revive a sexual relationship with his long time girlfriend. This led him into contracting HIV.

There is a Zambian adage that says 'Munda wa kale, suvuta lima ' which loosely translated means a field that has been cultivated before cannot be difficult to cultivate again.

While some may argue that this is not true, it has been said to work on issues to do with sex.

For 49-year-old Elvis, this theory worked for him when he was living in Kenya in the early 1980s.

But unfortunately for him, besides rekindling his relationship with his old flame, he got the HIV virus.

Elvis was diagnosed with HIV in 2002.

He says he has both bitter and sweet memories of Nairobi.
"For my sweet memories, I was staying in Kenya and while I was working there, I met a Kikuyu lady. We got involved and we fell in love and in the process, we had a child together. The boy is now a first year student at Nairobi University," he says.
Elvis who works for the New Vision newspaper in Uganda says to a certain degree, he also has sour memories.

"Most people who are HIV positive do not know when and from which person they got the virus. I got the virus in Nairobi but it was imported from Uganda. While teaching here, I was a teacher before I became a journalist. I met a long-time girlfriend who had come to do business. We bumped into each other and revived our love. Little did I know that she had the virus. This was in 1982 and she was a long-time sweetheart and she gave me the virus," he says.

He says the woman is now deceased.

Elvis later got married to a Ugandan woman and at the time, he did not know his status.
He says he did not have children with the woman as she used to have miscarriages often.
Elvis says little did they know that it had something to do with the virus.
He says in 2002, he became very sick and lost weight, going from 78 kilogrammes to 36 kilogrammes.

Elvis says he was admitted to hospital but later discharged not because he had gotten better but because he was told to go and die home.
He says he had even been pronounced dead at some point.
Elvis says he was in a mess as he had full blown AIDS, his face was silken and his relatives and friends cried.

He says while at home, his uncle went to see him.
"He looked at my skin, it was the skin of a stranger. He could not bear my sight, he got a hanky and shed tears, and he asked me two questions. The first one being; 'my son, who infected you with the virus?' In the condition I was, I was not even talking. I was almost unconscious," he says.

Elvis says he did not know whether the question was asked out of sympathy or not.
"I was not in a position to answer where I got the virus. I don't know if he wanted me to explain but to me, how I got it was not important at that time. Most people are naïve and have the tendency of asking who infected you instead of asking whom I infected," he says.

Elvis says what mattered at the moment was his treatment and he could not imagine explaining that because he could not undo what happened.

Elvis says his uncle then turned to his mother and told her that their son was going to die.
"And he was speaking in a mother tongue and it sounded so different. I was listening and my uncle had given up. He had little hope and was convinced that I was going to die. But was that what I wanted to hear at that time?" he asks.

He says his wife had also walked out on him.

"She used to come and see me for five months because I was bedridden for a long time. I couldn't walk and after this, she packed her belongings and went because she didn't want to face the stigma. She left me to die on the sick bed. When I asked my mother where my wife was, she said she was sick and that was why she was unable to come and see me. She didn't want to tell me the truth" he says.

Elvis says he later telephoned the man that his former wife had become involved with and advised him to go for a blood test before they seriously got involved with each other.
He says the man accused him of being jealous and dismissed what he told him but he knows he had played his part.

Elvis says the Bible warns people to blow the trumpet to sound a warning to who should be a victim otherwise a person risks being punished if they know the truth and the pending danger and keep quiet about it.

He says when he decided to disclose his status in 2004 on television and other media, his uncle did not like it and said he had brought shame to the family.

Elvis says the uncle asked him why he had not masked his face but he told his uncle that when he disclosed his status, no one forced him and he did it voluntarily.
Elvis says he disclosed his status for a number of reasons.

He says some were altruistic and others were selfish.
Elvis says he did it because of regard for others.

"I wanted to give a face to HIV, particularly the professionals. You can still live and continue having the virus. If you have someone to love you, you can live and continue being active. I launched an AIDS crusade using the pen and I write using my personal experience," he says.

He says after being bedridden for a long time, he went back to work in September this year and everybody was happy to see in the office.

Elvis says he has since remarried and has a son who is HIV negative and gives credit to the PMTCT (Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission) programmes even though he says it was an expensive under taking.

He says he is a living testimony that being HIV positive is no longer a death sentence as a person can live long with ARVs.