Category Archives: Notes From Across the World

A Note from Lance, in Toronto…

“Well, Peter and I met in September of 2007. I was living in Philadelphia, and had just ended a 9 year relationship and had signed up for an gay dating website. Peter was living in Germany, and had also signed up for the same site. One night, I came across his photo and profile in a chat room. From that moment I saw him, I was hooked. At the time, he has said that when he came across my profile/pic, he said I looked so sad, and that is why he clicked on my profile.

From the day we had met, every day after that, we chatted. This was before voice chat, as we were both using yahoo instant messenger. For hours and hours we chatted about anything and everything. One night, about a month later, I decided to make a voice recording and send to him. The first words he heard me say to him in this recording was “I love you”. I could see him as he listened to it, and he repeated it back to me ,though I could not hear it. We entered a new phase, now we were sending voice recordings to one another, telling about our lives; family, friends past relationships. Once we started using Skype, then the voice chats started, and one of the first times a little after a month had past, he asked me to marry him, and of course I said yes. For the next two months we continued to chat every day for hours.

In January of 2008, I had the opportunity to travel to Sweden for work, which was the first time I had been out of the country. We planned that he would fly from Germany to Copenhagen, then we would travel together from Copenhagen to Sweden. This would be the first time we saw each other in person. Oh, how I was so nervous! Here was this person I had fallen in love with over the internet, chatted with for hours and hours, who knew more about me than anyone in any previous relationship, and we were finally going to be together, live and in person! I landed in Copenhagen first after a very long 6 hour flight from Philly, and not a wink of sleep on the plane! I waited for his flight to land, which seemed like it was taking for ever! (BTW, this was the first time he had ever been on a plane.) I saw his flight had landed, and my stomach became full of very active butterflies. My eyes were fixated on those giant doors coming from the international arrivals..and I waited, and waited and waited. After what seemed like an eternity, he appeared. My heart sank. My eyes filled up with tears, and as he walked toward me, I could feel my love for him become more intense. Here he was, walking toward me. This person I had only met a few months before. This person I fell in love with without ever having touched, but yet knew everything about me.

As we embraced, all I said to him softly in his ear was, “I love you, I love you, I love you” over and over. Finally, we were together! We spent the next week in Sweden exploring not only the city we were in, but each other. It was the best week ever!

Over the next few months, we continued chatting and calling each other every day. I traveled for work, he traveled to the US, and I went to Germany. Finally we decided that after a year of long distance, it was time to live in the same time zone/country. It was either I move to Germany, or we move to Canada. It is difficult to get into the US and since gay marriage was not recognized federally, we could not live in the US together. We finally decided that Canada would be the best option, since gay marriage was legal everywhere in Canada had been since 2003, it was the first choice. So, quickly, I made arrangements to secure a position with my current employer, and in November of 2008, we both moved to Canada, and were married on December 15, 2008.

Now that DOMA was struck down, I can now sponsor Peter for a green card, which we have started this past September. The need to be closer to family has changed our direction and we are now on our way to the US. I have secured a position with my current company, and will be moving to Kansas City, Missouri in February. Peter will be in Canada still until his green card process is complete, so unfortunately, we will be separated until approx. July. Of course we will be traveling back and forth between the US and Canada until that time, but we are beginning a difficult phase of our relationship. After living together for the past 5+ years, we are now going to be back to long distance, but in the end, we will be closer to family who live in Idaho.

Moving to Missouri, is going to be an interesting experience, as gay marriage is not legal there, and being in the mid west, where conservativeness reigns, will be interesting as well. But, in the end, family has taken us to this place, and that is what is important.”

photo provided by Lance

photo provided by Lance

A Note from Salvatore, in Buffalo…

“As a young 1st generation Italian-American in the ’80s growing up in the small community just north of the Adirondacks in New York I felt isolated not only because we didn’t have many other Italians in our community, but also as I grew older my loneliness and isolation became my suppression of myself as a gay man. I didn’t want to be gay and more importantly my fear was other people would find out. So I did what many people did, denied myself of who I was, kept quiet, remained a shy person, held in my emotions, and most importantly dated girls – or at least attempted to, but I wasn’t really good at it. Looking back I didn’t do these things intentionally knowing I was gay, I did them and acted this way because it’s all I knew how to be. I had a fear someone would know something about me that I didn’t know about myself. I’m not a feminine person and knowing I’m gay surprises many people, but the friends that really knew me as a teenager and as an adult; that really got to know me for me and knew my heart, soul, and mind – they knew I was gay before I knew. And when the time came for me to tell them I didn’t even have to say the words, they just said “I know! It’s ok, and I love you for trusting me and finally realizing who you are.”

My coming out was a difficult time as I’m sure it is for many gay youth. I was 18 years old and like many teens of the 90s, I started to explore the internet and went to chat rooms. In such a small community there was no gay youth center or gay groups in schools so I turned to the internet to explore this part of my life and my curiosity. I began chatting online with another gay Italian, the same age as myself. I felt relief finally not only in the fact that I had another Italian person to speak to, but most importantly another gay Italian – in those days I didn’t think gay existed, let alone gay Italians. He was going through what I was going through. We became great online friends for months and eventually met as he was only within an hours time in Montreal, Canada. Entrusting one another, and having started a friendship, over a few years we finally were able to admit to ourselves that we are gay, but just to each other. No one else could know. This was when my struggle with my family began as my mother eventually overheard us on the phone. She questioned everything I did until I finally had admitted it. Just saying the words “I’m gay” was like I had hit a brick wall. A brick wall of relief that I had taken down. I felt like the sun was shining upon me, birds were chirping, angels were singing, trumpets were playing – it was far from that – but I felt relief, like I had just been born. My heart pumped with joy and I felt a heavy burden was gone and I was no longer alone – even though I still at this time did not realize the extend of what there was out there for an LGBT community I knew who I was for the first time – and that in and of itself did not make me feel alone.

Eventually, after months of counseling with psychologists and priests, family arguments and disagreements, I decided to move across state to Buffalo, NY for college. My family and I began to get along better at a distance but my ‘dark secret’ was a burden to them, never spoken about to extended family, and when I visited home I couldn’t discuss my ‘gay lifestyle choice’, as my mother would call it. Soon, I began dating a guy, Steve, that I had met at a restaurant that we worked together in. We dated for four years before we moved in together. Even though my family knew about Steve, they never disrespected him in any way, they just did not discuss him. To them he was my roommate. The breaking point was when I told my mother Steve and I were going to be getting married. In the discussion I told her I had a new family, an accepting family that welcomed me, and that I wasn’t a humiliation to, and if Steve couldn’t be welcomed in her home I wasn’t welcomed either. It was then that my mother said to me that I was never a humiliation, she only feared what society would have done to me and how the world would have treated me. She’s never been more proud of me standing up for what I believe in and that I’ve become a stronger man that she’s never been more proud of. I guess our interpretation of how we view things, and how we believe others view things, will never change unless we speak up. Since then, Steve has been welcomed into my family’s homes and we celebrate holidays and events with each others families. We’ve been together 13 years now and since my struggle of coming out Steve has become my best friend, my companion, my heart and soul, the man I plan to grow old with and hopefully raise a family with someday.”

photo by Kevin Truong

photo by Kevin Truong

A Note from Jenny, in Oslo…

“Hello, Kevin! I really love your project.

First off, I have to say I am not gay – I’m not even a man – but I still find your project amazing and I check for new updates as often as possible. I love the pictures, and the stories of all the struggles people have been through just to be who they are – it is a reminder that we must never stop fighting injustice!

Here in Norway, things have moved fast the last couple of decades, and gay couples have been allowed to marry since 2009. I am very glad and only ashamed that it took THAT long to give people such a basic right. I have several gay friends and I’ve had the privilege to get to know them, to be one of the people they confided in when they came out and seeing how they have grown in confidence and happiness after they came out. One of my best friends came out just after junior high (by then, we had already known for years), and he is today in a very committed relationship! He had been teased and picked on by boys in his class since he was little, after PE they refused to shower with him because they thought he was gay, and sometimes they would throw his clothes out – even into the snow during winter. He never let them take his spirit away, proudly continued being himself, dancing, doing the things he loved – and by the time he came out, most of his childhood bullies had already apologized (and, being the amazing person he is, he forgave them for their narrow-mindedness). I suppose my point here is to just let people know that even though I in no way know what you’re going through, know that there are lots and lots of us out there who support you all the way, and want to help you realize that things DO get better.

Keep up your great work, Kevin – you are clearly inspiring and comforting people all over the world. Norway welcomes you, if you ever decide to visit! We have plenty of happy couples here to photograph :)”