Kimo, Department Coordinator, Portland, Oregon

photo by Kevin Truong

In Kimo’s own words:“Being queer for me has been a journey of coming to terms with myself and reconciling my past to forge a sustainably healthy and happy future. I was born on a small island called Saipan thrown in the ocean between somewhere and nowhere, I won’t lie it was complete paradise but it was paradise for the heterosexual machismo type guy – I was and am not that person. Most people ask where the heck is Saipan and for some just saying my island’s near Guam is enough, for others who think Guam is in the India Ocean I give more recognizable markers, south of Japan and east of Philippines – this vague broad area satisfies a western colonized frame of geography. On this small paradise being queer was a zero sum game, I could live a never-happy calm and fake straight life or I could live a challenging open queer life. Neither option sat well with me so I scrounged up some scholarship money, booked a flight to Portland, and I’ve been living a life I know I don’t regret a moment of since. I am living an intersectional existence, I was born on a US territory automatically giving me US citizenship but it came at a cost that I am continuously assessing. I say this because though I have been granted US citizenship many “Americans” never truly see me as one, I say this because my American identity clashes with my indigenous roots, I say this because my mother who is from the Republic of Palau navigates the US as an immigrant and so my narrative will always be effected by immigration policy, attitudes towards immigrants, conversations concerning immigrants, I say this because my people under this administration is starting to feel what it is truly like to be under the thumb of a white man in power and most Americans don’t even know this let alone recognize this chasm of disconnect between being an American and living as a modern day US colonial subject in 2018 – though this has always been the case for indigenous communities around the world. My intersectional existence is a mixture of my Queer, Indigenous, Fem, american POC identities and like all things living this too continues to change and grow. Living a Queer POC life in Portland is a constant fight of recognition, of defending my identities, expressing my self worth. It’s a struggle living in a majority white liberal city like Portland where I have to navigate both white wokeness and white ignorance sometimes both at the same time with the same person – I’ve become very good at juggling lately. I’ve also had to work harder towards finding my communities and nourishing my budding brown fem indigenous spirit all the while being in that limbo state of mind where I am in my late 20s thinking shit am I adulting yet or could I escape that for just a few more years? The answer regrettably is I am adulting and I have to suck it up and grow up. The advice I would give a younger me would be to breathe more, take a moment from everything to take a breath – constantly fighting to exist can be draining so don’t be afraid to take moment for yourself and breathe in the air, the space, the life you are fighting for.’

THE GAY MEN PROJECT

The visual catalog of gay and queer men around the world.

Kimo, Department Coordinator, Portland, Oregon

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