When Stanley Ngara first began educating young Kenyans about safe sex, he quickly realised that many of them were too uncomfortable to pay attention to his message on HIV prevention. To them, condoms were associated with prostitution, and having grown up in homes where sex was never openly discussed, they found it difficult to listen to such topics being addressed in public.
Ngara understood that a different strategy was necessary. Instead of the serious, formal style commonly used by sexual health educators, he decided to use humour to capture attention. His initial attempt with puppets was still not enough to fully connect with his audience. This led him to create a bold new persona — Africa’s “King of Condoms.”
“In Africa, people don’t talk about sex,” the 45-year-old explained. “They don’t talk about condoms. There is a lot of stigma. But the way I dress now makes people curious about who I am, and that curiosity makes them want to listen.”