If sometimes your life is hard, being gay makes it harder. One of my biggest challenges was to open my eyes. I was 100% percent catholic, I studied my religion always trying to be the best. My religion was one of the most important things in my life, but for a long time I felt I was betraying my beliefs, I was betraying myself. Now I understand I don’t need a religion. I have God, and he is full of love.

The LGBT community in Santiago doesn’t seem to be a community. Most of the time our interests are as different as the people who are involved in this group. The good thing is that in some cases we create a strong force who is trying to change our country.

(With regards to coming out) At the beginning it was so easy to lie to my family because I lived in Santiago by myself. After a while, everything about me was wrong, It was so hard to carry on with all my problems that I collapsed. I got very sick….. When I told them, my life changed so much! I can not even explain how it felt, but I will be always so thankful of the family I have.

Advice I’d give to my younger self: never forget to live your life. We don’t have a time machine and nobody deserves to live just a half of their own life.

To me, being gay doesn’t mean anything, being yourself is matter. Because when you are who you are, what you are you will know what to do. During my “boy-time” being gay was all about discovering my own questions and gave myself the defend when hearing that is not ok, is freak and unnatural, especial with a shy boy like me.

My (coming out) story, it happened a bit late, I always wait for the right moment and it happened when I was 25. First I came out to my close friend, I think she is ready for it, and it was relief to me with her caring: “that’s why I took you to see another gay friend of mine”. That made me more confident to talked to another friends. But it didn’t work easy to my mom, she was confuse and hasn’t believed it yet, she still think everything has its cure… she believe it is a choice and can fix it. This gonna be a challenge, still is my challenge…

La ley de Matrimonio Igualitario que logramos en Argentina fue el desafío más notable que hemos tenido los homosexuales no solo en nuestro querida patria sino también en toda América.

Nunca tuve que salir del placard porque nunca me sentí adentro. Lo que sí hicimos con mi marido, fue iniciar el camino para lograr la sanción de la ley que mencioné anteriormente. La exposición mediática por ese tema, me dio más fuerza y convicción acerca de quién soy y lo que quiero

(The Gay community in Buenos Aires) Muy variada, muy ecléctica. Desde las personas trans hasta los/las homosexuales con aspecto hétero, las diferencias son enormes. Pero podemos ponernos rápidamente de acuerdo cuando hay que luchar por el respeto que nos merecemos solo por ser seres humanos.

I never had to leave the closet because I never felt inside. What I did with my husband we did was to start the way for the enactment of the law that I mentioned earlier. The media exposure for the subject, gave me more strength and conviction about who I am and what I want.

(The gay community in Buenos Aires is) Varied, eclectic. With trans people up to / with hetero homosexual aspect, the differences are huge. But we quickly agreed to fight for the respect we deserve just because we are all human.