Tag Archives: the gay men project

Mike, Writer, Melbourne, Australia

photo by Kevin Truong

Mike, in his own words: “Creating identity is the job of a lifetime. We establish a few solid building blocks in our early years, and then spend the rest of our lives cultivating our personal interests, tastes, preferences and desires. Being gay was a building block I didn’t want, nor something I wanted as part of my identity.

Given that I felt negatively toward it for so many years, it gives me comfort that being gay isn’t something I obsess over today. This is not a pernicious statement, it’s just a reflection of the person I am in this moment – a confident man, dedicated to his family and friends, who is at ease with himself. It’s taken a long time to get here, and I’m happy that I no longer see my sexuality as something I have to reveal to people. I just am.

Being printed in Hello Mr magazine will always be a very special moment for me. I had harbored a secret desire to be a writer for a long time, but it wasn’t until Ryan encouraged me to submit, that I really pursued it as something I could actually do. I’m not ashamed to say that seeing my words in print for the first time brought tears to my eyes.

A couple of months after the magazine was released, I received a message from a reader who said my piece had resonated with him. He told me his story of growing up gay, and how he had spent a lot of his childhood feeling alone and ostracized. He explained that my piece, and the entire magazine, had made him feel less isolated, and that for the first time in his life he truly felt as though he’d found his community. The experience of receiving this message changed my notion of success completely. From that moment on, I knew that if something I had written had a positive impact on even just one person, then I had produced something of value. That is what success means to me today.

I didn’t think I was up for the challenge of being a gay man. As a teenager I would lie in bed at night and pray to god to change me, to take away the feelings I had for other guys. I blamed those feelings for being picked on at school; the single difference that the other guys sniffed out and targeted me because of. By age 17 I knew that the feelings were not going away, and so the prayers changed. I no longer asked for god to take the feelings away, I simply said, ‘if I am gay, don’t let me wake up in the morning’.

When I came out at 28, none of the fears I had about being a gay man eventuated. My parents did not disown me, my sisters did not refuse to let me see their children, and my friends did not stop talking to me. I realize that this is not the same for everyone, and that I have been incredibly lucky with the people who have joined me on the journey.

It may sound cliché, but the biggest barrier to my coming out was me. I spent a great deal of time thinking about how I would manage the feelings of others, concocting speeches that would highlight how ‘normal’ I was, despite the fact I was gay. Imagining the negative responses of others always dissuaded me from telling the truth. When I came to the realization that I was only responsible for my own feelings, and in turn my future happiness, I was enabled to speak honestly about myself, and everything else just fell into place.

The gay community in Melbourne is incredibly diverse, with clubs and groups for every type of interest. While I don’t have a great deal to do with the wider community, I’m very fortunate to have a close group of gay friends – they are my community. All of my friends are quite different, and each brings something unique. I love the balance their different qualities provide, a beautiful interplay of strengths that challenge and inspire.

I often wonder; would my younger self heed any advice my older self would give? The scared young man who catalogued his words and movements meticulously so he could eradicate ones that arose suspicion would be unlikely to listen to wisdom that has taken time to cultivate and understand. I think to keep it simple I’d plant a few seed ideas, in the hope that early exposure to them might grow them faster. Here’s what I’d say:

“Be honest, even if it scares you. Know your worth. Ask for help when you need it.”

Michele, Student, Oderzo, Italy

photo by Kevin Truong

Michele, in his own words: “Being homosexual means self-confidence and bravery.

We’re not superheroes or flawless; what I’m trying to say is that thanks to our personal and wearying stories, we can truly appreciate the value of freedom, respect and the priority of happiness.

It is a hard climb, but I wouldn’t change my nature for any reason in the world, because the vibe, the warmth and the magic you get by loving your mate is something inexplicable, that goes beyond people’s judgements.

At the age of 17 I can’t talk about veritable challenges and successes, I have all my life in front of me. As my biggest successes I would say defining who I am and who I want to become and finding the fierceness to face society.

Everyone at school took the announcement easily, more than I’ve expected, I guess because it was rather evident. The hardest part of my coming out story deals with my parents. One night, this fall, I came back home with a new bright hair colour: I was very glad about it, it aired the emotional equilibrium I finally reached, but my parents didn’t feel the same. As soon as I passed through the door my dad said: “Run to the bathroom. I’m shaving that mess off your head”.

It may sound melodramatic, but this was the straw that broke the camel’s back: it was the nth time I had to conform to people’s churchy ethic, the nth time I felt forced to conceal. I wanted them to be informed about my homosexuality and understand that their every trial would never be able to change that, because it surpasses the simple appearance.

Since then our relationship hasn’t improved: I knew it would go this way; I only wanted to be honest with them (but yeah, at the bottom of my heart I always hoped that the love for a son could beat this disagreement).

Here in Oderzo there isn’t a gay community in the real meaning of the word: most commonly you find small firmly defined groups that are not very keen on hanging out with new guys (it sounds pretty elite).

Furthermore there are boys in the closet, sometimes homophobic on the outside, that hide themselves behind body pictures on Grindr, looking for sex and then avoiding one another when walking down the street.

The lack of gay places, beyond the cultural background, has probably worsened the situation, but at the end of the day this feeling of individuality doesn’t seem to bother many people.

“You can’t be tamed”, that’s what I’d love to say to my younger self. As a human being you’re free to establish what the best is for you, in every perspective of your life, whether it is professional or sentimental.”

Wayne, Graphic Designer/Traveler, Palawan, Philippines

photo by Kevin Truong

Wayne, in his own words: “I came out at the age of 34 while living in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Not the most obvious place to do so as it is still illegal there, punishable until recently by the death sentence, and even now by decades in prison.

I was born in Zimbabwe and grew up in South Africa, but despite the fact that by the 1990’s South Africa was legislatively one of the most advanced countries in the world (being one of the first to legalise gay marriage), it was still deeply conservative, with deeply entrenched views on gender, sexuality and ethnicity.

I grew up therefore among homophobic sentiments, and had my own prejudices about what homosexuality meant. To be a gay man to me meant flapping your arms around, sashaying your hips and calling everyone ‘dahhhrling’. But I was a straight looking, straight acting guy who got the attention of girls, so HOW could I be gay?

I dated women all through my teens and early twenties, but the romance usually flickered quite quickly into friendship. I did look at men, but if I was attracted to them, I told myself that I just wanted to be like them, not that I actually wanted to be with them. I was, in retrospect, always gay: I just couldn’t accept it then.

At the age of 19 I had my first ‘relationship’ with a man, and not the sort you’d expect, but which lead me to believe even more so that being gay was not for me. I started receiving letters at home and work from an unknown older man confessing his undying love for me. I was flattered at first, but I told myself that it was because I was getting attention, not actually because I was turned on by a man being attracted to me. I also then started getting phone calls where nobody would speak, and in a later letter from this man I found out that it was him who was calling. It became incessant, and eventually, when receiving one of these silent calls, I told him to please leave me alone. The situation unfortunately then turned into a full blown obsession for this mystery man and I was forced to get the police involved and eventually, after some death threats, decided to leave South Africa for a while and spent the next year backpacking around Europe and the Middle East.

I always try to look at the positive side of things, so I will be eternally grateful that this situation lead me to my passion for travel, but I also believe that it was a main reason I didn’t come out earlier and for a long time associated being gay to this negative experience.

In my late twenties, I started experimenting with drugs, and the inhibition which comes with it allowed me to experiment for the first time with men. It often felt good at the time, but afterwards I was filled with confusion and shame: What had I done? Was this really who I was?

By my early thirties, I found myself really depressed, drinking more and binge spending to fill what was missing, and to hide what I then knew: that I was gay. I was haunted by what my friends and family would say; if they’d be repulsed by me; reject me; if they’d still see me for who I was; if they’d still love me.

I decided to take a drastic life change: to move away from South Africa again and to start a ‘new life’. I began work in Tanzania in 2010, and I loved it immediately: the ocean, the people and the animals, of course, but even the power cuts, the contradictions and the complexities. I felt happier than I had been in a very long time.

It was here that I met a couple of guys via Gaydar who finally revealed my ignorance on what it meant to be gay, and showed me that being gay wasn’t only for the camp and the extravagant (who I love and admire for their honesty and openness, by the way). Most of my online chats never led to sex, but to talk honestly with like-minded people was life changing. One of the friends I met through Gaydar fast tracked my journey, for he was good looking and straight acting; furthermore he lived in a remote village in Tanzania training rats to search for landmines!!! WTF! If he could be gay and proud then why the hell couldn’t I?

It was a year until the Rat Trainer and I actually met face to face, and nothing happened between us that night, but it was an evening filled with fun, tequila, dancing, silliness and great conversation. For the first time in my life, I felt absolutely happy and 100% myself: I will never to forget that night.

The next day I took action, flew to see my mum, and over a glass of wine, blurted out that I was gay. She was a little taken aback but assured me that she wished me to be happy above all things, and that she loved me unconditionally. She was AMAZING. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done to tell her; but getting her unconditional support made my next steps easy.

Over the next year, I began having dinners with my friends and family, and telling them one by one. I was unbelievably lucky for I didn’t receive a single negative comment or reaction. Hearing other people’s coming out stories, I realize how unusual this is, and it’s made me doubly appreciative of all the wonderful people I have in my life.

The thing I probably struggled with the most after coming out was heartbreak. I was now in a position to openly feel something towards someone else and at the age of 34 I fell head over heels in love for the first time which then led to the my heart being completely shattered for the first time. Going through what most people experience in their late teens and early twenties at the age of 34 was not easy for me and took me a while to recover from. But I did, and met another wonderful man who taught me a lot about love and passion, but due to long distance and a fairly significant age difference it was also not meant to be, but I am happy to still call him my friend.

3 years on, after multiple dates, romances and heartbreaks, I have learned that being gay is just like any other ‘normal’ relationship. It’s about feeling a connection to another human being and wanting to share everything you have with them.

So, where am I now? About a year ago I met an amazing Spanish man who I’ve travelled the world with and who has shown me what a really loving relationship is like: nothing is hidden between us. Everything is – as it should be – completely in the open.

With the love of friends and family and a boyfriend I adore, I can’t wait to see what the future holds. For sure, everything got better when I finally kicked down that closet.”