After a move from East to South, I’m resettled in London and am ready for new adventures. I’d like to:
The BBC doco World’s Worst Place to be Gay? had quite an unexpected impact on me.
The one-off show follows BBC1 Scott Mills’ travels to Uganda as he to speaks to everyday people to discover the extent of homophobia in the country – he’s searching for the reasons why Uganda tried to introduce a death penalty for homosexuality.
An outstanding moment was when Mills met a group of gay and lesbian people living together in a slum; hated by their community, rejected by their families, and constantly harassed and beaten – they remain resilient. One brave Ugandan gay man declared:
We are born gay, we shall live (as) gays, we shall die (as) gays.
While we now know the Ugandan Anti-Homosexuality Bill proposing death for gay and lesbian people has not be instituted, the hatred has not passed since Mills’ visit. His interviewees said gays should be hanged and have “everything bad… done to them”. Indeed, some Ugandans take matters into their own hands, administering beatings or worse, such as ‘curing’ lesbianism with rape.
Like 1.5 million other people, I have signed the Avaaz Petition that condemns the bill and any future iteration of it. To change the mindset of the majority of the Ugandan community is a complex issue; but great things can be achieved with small steps – the first step is to watch Mills’ documentary and the second is to sign the petition.
They say ‘history is written by the winners’.
I have difficulty finding decent resources on past Vietnamese leaders, because of this adage. Vietnamese history has undergone so many rewrites under various regimes that it’s sometimes difficult to pick the heros and villains of Vietnamese culture. Even gods and goddesses fall in and out of favour depending on the government of the day.
Vietnamese people are a hardy and resilient; in the blood of my people is the lineage of centuries of accomplishment through hardship. We have defeated Imperial China (twice), stopped the Mongol hordes at our doorstep (twice) and taken on the greatest world powers of their time including the French, Japanese and Americans.
While every time we have retained our country, each battle and war sees part of history destroyed. Also during the period in which we are dominated by the stronger power, our culture is eroded. Raiders pillage treasures; reformers burn libraries and ‘defenders’ bomb cities from above.
Also, of the remaining books, publications could suffer from poor translation from old Chu Nom script (based on Ancient Chinese) to modern Vietnamese; even poorer translation from Vietnamese to English; or worse rewrites to suit a contemporary political agenda. Truly, history is written by the winners.
Vietnam has men dressed as women perform for important events. Why?
I want to share the basic outline of the Đồng Tính Luyến Ái Project (DTLA Project) with you.
What’s the big idea?
The Đồng Tính Luyến Ái Project will be an 8 part series on gay and lesbian Vietnam. It well give the listener a feel for what it is like to be Vietnamese and gay (whether Vietnamese born, overseas immigrant or overseas-born). It will focus on the social, religious, political and technological factors that impact on private lives.
There will be a mix of factual reporting and personal interviews. The each part will half an hour and content will be in Vietnamese and English (with Vietnamese content translated).
Five core topics have been identified:
What’s involved?
A budget will include funding to support research, scripting, recording, editing and broadcasting activities.
Who’s needed?
Roles required are a programme producer, presenter, audio engineer / editor, interviewer, researcher, copy writer, and translator.
What’s the plan?
A production schedule will identify research, scripting, recording, editing and broadcasting activities. Initial interview and volunteer requests have been made. A formal proposal for budgeting and grant application purposes will be completed soon.
I believe that the programme enlighten most listeners and expose them to a world they are not familiar with. Indeed I expect I too will learn things. For example, why a male dancer (pictured) dresses as a woman to perform for store grand openings in Vietnam (it is a common cultural practice at funerals too)!
A young man named Graeme Taylor has made the top of my gay list; things that inspire me.
I was recently researching gay teen depression and suicide and there was a heart breaking moment when I read a quote from a family who had lost their gay son to suicide:
“Our hope is that our family’s personal tragedy will serve as a call for compassion, empathy and human dignity”
After seeing that quote I cracked and had to take a break. I walked around London listening to ‘Firework” crying, tears cued by the line:
“If you only knew what the future holds, after a hurricane comes a rainbow”
In my mind, the best thing we can do to help prevent gay youth suicide is to arm our young people with knowledge, understanding and the skill to critically think and openly speak for themselves.
I believe we must encourage emotional intelligence in children and young people. Let them say “I think…” and “I feel…” and as adults we must seriously consider what they say. When we treat young people as equal, we enable the human dignity inherent in them.
What I find incredible about the video with Graeme Taylor is the gentle grace in which he puts his arguments. This young man moves me with the eloquence of his words, spoken purely from the heart. When Taylor, 14, talks of attempting suicide at 9 years of age you realise he has overcome his tragedy and turned it into a source of strength.
Taylor is a shining example of how much we can learn from young people when we give them space to express themselves. The world could certainly do with more young gay people like this, and in Taylor’s words:
“Everyone has a voice and some people are kinda scared to go out there and share it, but when you do it’s a wonderful thing.”
If you ever need someone to talk to, you can contact Lifeline (in Australia) or the Victorian Gay and Lesbian Switchboard from 6pm to 10pm each night.
I find it deliciously ironic that I was robbed at Lenin Square in Hanoi.
One day in Vietnam, I switched off all my online profiles.
My Facebook, Twitter and other online profiles were made private, suspended or deleted. It seems a bit melodramatic, but at the time I was petrified. I think it’s a bit silly actually, because looking back, I can declare with certainty that:
So why did I panic and go underground?
It comes back to what used to be my ‘greatest fear’; to be lost in a foreign country with no job, no money, no contacts.
My wallet was stolen in Hanoi and I thought everything was fine (I froze my cards, had emergency cash and my precious passport), but things got weird when I was emailed by a ‘concerned mother’ who wanted to return my wallet. It was an obvious (and common) scam and I knew better than to fall prey.
I made it clear I wasn’t going to hand over my cash, but they started to harass me on Facebook. That’s when I freaked out. The blackmailers were one degree of separation away from my blogs and twitter. In my wallet was also my hotel card and my Australian address. My online and physical presence was known.
I was worried about my tweets because they could have been misinterpreted. In Australia we challenge the status quo as we wish, but in Vietnam there is no such thing as peaceful dissidence and one does not simply challenge the the Government.
Despite many young Vietnamese telling me ‘do as you wish here, it’s a free country’ there is a big difference to the Australian interpretation of the word ‘freedom’.
Having said that, the need to be careful of what you tweet is not just something you should be wary of in the East. In London there have been two cases of arrest and prosecution over a Tweet. All over the world it seems like freedom of speech is fast fading.
Sailing into a storm to capture this photo was bloody scary!
My parents were boat people.
They came to Australia separately on rickety little boats that traversed, against all odds, the tricky and deadly flood waters of the Mekong Delta and tyrannical South China Sea.
Growing up, my parents were like ships passing in the night, they only saw each other as they swapped shifts. Mum worked mornings and dad worked night. They got food on the table, paid the mortgage and most importantly, had my sister and I educated at private school and university.
My extended family also worked hard to educate their children. Across the whole family we’ve turned out 2 doctors, 3 engineers, 1 financier, 4 public service administrators, 3 media makers and there’s a dozen still studying. We, as children of immigrants, contribute to Australian society through our work as well as our volunteering at non-profit organisations.
Based on this, I condemn both major political parties in Australia for their unjust stance on boat people this election year. The ‘turn the boats back’ policy is shamefully inhumane and a revolting political position. Labor and Liberal are perpetuating the notion that boat people are unknown mass that do no more than drain the resources of our country. My family is proof that this far from the truth.
Until the two main Australian parties stop playing same-same politics (saying what they think is necessary to win marginal electorates), I will vote for neither. Yesterday at the Australian Consulate polling booth, the irony did not pass me by that I was in the Communist country my parents fled casting a democratic vote.
Most ironic though was that here in the reddest of countries, I voted left for Green.
@danvogue
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