Winter 2000 – The Identity Issue

Queer and Asian – Serving the Queer Asian and Pacific Islander Community of Seattle

As each year closes I think about what the next year holds for Q&A. Sometimes I even wonder if we'll survive another year. But not this year, because we're presenting "Lotus Roots 3: An International Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgendered Gathering".

At this conference we'll have presentations, workshops, panel discussions, art exhibits and performances, all produced by and for queer Asian Pacific Islanders. Topics will range from sex to self-defense to sex to e-zines to sex to domestic violence to sex. You get the picture. It will last a day and a half, including an evening of performances by queer Asian artists at Theatre Off Jackson.

In addition to being an exciting program, Lotus Roots will give us a chance to show our stuff to queer Asians from the entire West Coast, and more importantly it shows our local Puget Sound gay Asian men who we are. I'm expecting that many will come to the gathering and hopefully become a regular part of Q&A.

In order to have a successful (meaning fun and enlightening) gathering, we've got to put our hearts and souls into producing it. A group of committed API women and men has been meeting every other Monday for the last few months, and things are beginning to take shape. A number of people have already submitted proposals for workshops, discussion groups and performances that form the start of a program. We've selected dates (20-21 May 2000). We've booked a site (Seattle Central Community College). We're gathering sponsors (to be named later). We even have a logo (featured above).

A few months ago I headed south to Orange County for a family reunion. As expected, my parents drove me crazy, the sky was obscured with thick smog, and the traffic was nightmarish. Yet despite all of its faults, the "southland" is not without its merits.

SoCal offers amazing nightlife, the glamour of a region fueled by show biz money, In-n-Out Burgers & Krispy Kreme donuts, as well as a rich ethnic tapestry unparalled in the U.S. This is a place where people of color are impossible to ignore -- where communities of color play center stage in a dynamic and expanding economy.

Living in Seattle where people of color (especially gay ones) are easily and often ignored challenges us to constantly consider what it means to be Asian and gay in a city that is mostly white and heterosexual.

A few years back, a friend’s well-intentioned boyfriend asked innocently if there was actually a difference between being "just" gay versus being gay and Asian. (Sorry friend. I really like your boyfriend.) Well, yeah, there is a difference and we all need to learn about those ways our experiences as gay Asian and Pacific Islanders are special and unique. So, at the risk of being a little too "academic," (hey, it's a living, ok?) this issue of MB will focus on exploring our IDENTITIES.

A Hui Hou!

I was born in a tiny town right smack in the boonies several hundred miles south of Manila. It wasn’t such a bad place: it had paved roads, houses built to Western standards with well-manicured lawns, tree-lined cul-de-sacs, a community park with an Olympic-size swimming pool, and even a nine-hole golf course and clubhouse.

Outward Western appearances notwithstanding, life in my hometown retained a distinctively Filipino flavor. This isn’t surprising since Filipinos comprised the majority of the residents and our prevailing cultural background continued to influence perspectives on politics, religion, society, and particularly, gender roles.

At an early age I was exposed to the traditional Filipino view on gender roles, which draws heavily from the country’s Spanish colonial past when men were expected to aggressively defend their honor while women demurely stood by their men and managed the home. I learned what was socially expected of me as a young boy and how those expectations differed for my female friends.

My parents taught me that it was unacceptable for boys to put on make-up, play with dolls, grow their hair long, wear skirts, and outwardly express their affection for other boys. Failure to adhere to these rules meant merciless ridicule and was tantamount to social suicide. Although I did not agree with such a black and white definition of the sexes (especially since I had already begun to entertain homosexual thoughts), resistance to the established norm seemed futile. I buried whatever deviant feelings I had and tried my best to fit in.

I first became familiar with the term bakla (a generic Tagalog word for homosexual/transvestite/transsexual) when I was seven. Once, I accompanied my mother to the beauty salon in the nearby city to pay Sophie, her favorite hairstylist, a visit. I didn’t know what to make of Sophie when I first met her. After all, she looked, dressed, and acted like a woman, yet instinct dictated to me that Sophie was really a man. When I unabashedly pointed out my observations to my mother, she discreetly explained that Sophie was bakla and then signaled me to be quiet.

While transvestites and/or effeminate homosexuals in the U.S. are ridiculed (even by some members of the gay community), they are openly tolerated in the Philippines as long as they openly embrace the bakla stereotype. Masculine men who covertly engage in homosexual behavior, however, are frowned upon.

I failed to comprehend how Sophie could oppose the norm and yet somehow still manage to integrate herself into mainstream Filipino society. She held a respectable job and built a good reputation for herself. Because Sophie embraced the bakla stereotype (and therefore tacitly accepted her status as the weaker sex), even the macho Filipino males in the community tolerated her.

Sophie continued to embody my hope, as I grew older and became increasingly aware of my homosexuality, that I could still find a place within Filipino mainstream society. Nevertheless, I had no desire to sacrifice my masculinity in order to embrace the bakla stereotype in order to fit in. I didn’t want to be a social outcast either. Thankfully, that dilemma resolved itself when I immigrated to the United States.

For the first time this year, I seriously considered not going to Jennifer and Kenji’s house to celebrate the holidays and share in what is always a great feast. It’s become a tradition among my Hawai’i-born friends that we potluck at every major event – birthdays, holidays, the new year – always doing our best to emulate the feast our parents no doubt once created for us.

Jen and Kenji got married earlier this year but nothing has really changed. They are still the same cool straight couple that I was lucky enough to once live next door to, who don’t assume things about me because of my sexuality, and with whom I would trust my life. Still, their parties have become increasingly less enjoyable for me.

At one recent dinner, a friend of a friend joined our party. I overhead him tell a story about a guy with soft qualities. He repeatedly used the word "faggot" in his story and every time he said the word, it seemed to ring louder and louder in my head. After sitting and listening in silence, I finally excused myself and drove home in a daze -- angry with myself for not speaking up.

Through that experience, I think I now understand the concept of "safety." Those gatherings weren’t "safe" for me because they forced me to tolerate homophobic comments, speak out in a way that is uncomfortable, or compromise my identity as a gay Asian. Jen and Kenji, no matter how cool, aren’t able to shield me from the intolerant idiots who seem to show up at our dinners.

For some reason, when I was younger it was easy for me to choose being Asian over being gay. I defined myself by my ethnicity and that definition in turn defined my career and livelihood. However, that once clear separation between my identities is now very blurry.

Each of the close friends I’ve made in the last twelve months is both gay and Asian. We share interests, a common outlook on life, and can shield each other from the dual forces of racism and homophobia that operate in our lives. These experiences sometimes make me wonder if I’ll have any straight friends when I’m older…

I was recently at the Crossroads Mall shopping for Christmas gifts. After purchasing some Pokemon toys and cards for my nephews, I went to get them gift-wrapped. The lady at the counter was filling out the claim tickets for my order, and then said, "Here are your tickets. Like you Chinese at your laundry store, 'no ticky, no washy.’" To her it meant nothing when she said that. In her mind, I was an Asian. In her mind, Asians were associated with Chinese laundry stores. In her mind, all Chinese speak like that.

Identity and discrimination are distinct aspects of both the society and individuals. The chemical reactions of identity and discrimination define who we are as individuals and how society evolves to accommodate differences among its members.

My first time traveling to Hong Kong in 1992 was an experience I can never forget. The first sight that greeted me when I emerged from the gate was a huge mass of Chinese. It was an overwhelming sight. For the first time since childhood, I felt that being Chinese was normal. It was a moment of relief, relief from clinging on to my Chinese identity, relief from trying to fit in where I do not fit in, and relief from fear of discrimination because of my ethnicity. At that moment, memories from the past swelled like a tidal wave.

The first day our family moved to the United States, my cousins took us to the park. Two Caucasian children were playing on the slide. My younger brother and I went up to the slide. They said something to us, but we didn't understand. Then they started mocking us in words that sounded like Chinese. I understood this mocking clearly and even my younger brother got the message. He was only five years old. My brother told me they were teasing us, and I told him to ignore them.

That was how I learned to deal with racism and discrimination. I ignored them. My family was new to this world, and they didn't know how to deal with these issues, let alone help us dealing with them. I clung on to what little I knew about my Chinese ethnicity, and I tried to find comfort in being Chinese. I believed that if I were to let go, I would have no basis for any value in me.

At the same time, I felt abandoned: abandoned by my family for not being able to help me; abandoned by my fatherland because it is so poor and so full of hungry and uneducated people; abandoned by my culture that is so rigid and ancient that the world is ready to leave it behind; abandoned by this new world that rather see me rot in my fatherland.

There was the memory of my first love in eighth grade. My first love for a boy. I sat at the back of the class, and he sat near the center of the class. I often found myself stealing glances at him, and daydreaming about life with him. I yearned to speak to him. But each time he spoke to me, I could only answer him shyly and then found an excuse to move away. I dared not reveal my desire to him.

Finally graduation came, and I felt for the first time the anguish of not seeing him again. Tears flooded my eyes as the principal handed out the graduation certificates. Then I passed out, collapsed, and an ambulance came to take me away. The doctors checked me out, and couldn't find anything wrong with me. To this day, I am the only one that knew why I passed out that day.

I did not know the word homosexuality until high school. But with that first love, I was conscious of my homosexuality. I had no one to talk to about it. Like everything else I had to hide, I hid it in the closet. Needless to say, my adolescent and early adult years were filled with anger, depression, frustration, and countless thoughts of death.

How did I survive? How will I continue to survive? With miracles aside, I've learned an important lesson in life - the lesson of perspective. I find that even at the darkest moment of my life, if I can even imagine or remember a twinkle of happiness and focus on that, then life isn't too bad. There are infinite variables affecting my life and not within my control, but there is one variable that I have absolute control over. That's the variable of perspective.

With this perspective, I no longer see myself as a helpless homosexual Asian living in a predominantly heterosexual Caucasian world. Rather I'm an individual feeling content being who I am, making positive contribution to my society. I do not see society as my enemy, but rather a part of my world, like my garden that I can sow seeds and nourish them to blossom. Identity is not a crisis. Discrimination doesn't have to be.

Three years ago, I wrote an article about my gay coming out experience. Today I'm writing about another facet of my life, which in addition to being gay, adds to who I've become over the years. So here is another coming out story, of a different closet, that I'll share in hope that I can write about identity and what that word means to me. So, bear with me as I back up a bit in time to an earlier beginning--no, not that beginning, you silly-billy.

Just before moving to Seattle a little more than four years ago, I wandered around Honolulu, disgusted and angered by my life. I was mad at everyone there. I tried so hard to be someone I was not, and I didn't like the people who wouldn't believe in who I tried to be. Angrily and spitefully, I packed it up and moved to Seattle to find a new life. I moved with the intent of re-inventing my identity.

Needless to say, the problems I tried to escape came with me to Seattle, too. Yet I didn't realize this until later, and at that time I thought I was doing a splendid job of finding myself by going on the run.

You see, back then I understood the idea of identity to mean what others thought of me. No matter what I did, or how I treated people, I believed my identity was defined by other people's opinions of me. I thought, as all I had to do was figure out the people around me and then appeal to their way of thinking. It was easy at first, as no one in Seattle knew me.

Of course people began to figure me out before I figured them out, and I began to lose track of which one of my personalities went with which acquaintance. Yeah, I was batting a thousand on understanding who I was, and it got worse.

My behavior at this point closely paralleled my behavior as a closeted gay man: lying, hiding, cheating, you name it. I did what ever it took to manipulate that image people had of me.

About a year after I moved, my troubles began to grow. Keeping up the identity was becoming increasingly difficult and I turned to anything that could help me maintain this control. I was getting drunk and stoned all the time, I would take pills without knowing what effect they would have on me, I was reporting to work high and at late hours, and on and on. Ironically, all that I did while trying to control my life ended up taking me out of control. My life had become terribly unmanageable.

I was living in a completely insane mess. I eventually lost my job, I almost lost my apartment, I had all kinds of people living with me, and finally I thought my only solution for living was simply to die. I figured suicide was the only solution I had for living. The manufactured identity that I had tried so hard to maintain had crumbled, and my true colors had brought me to this turning point. I hadn't a clue what I was to do. But, I was lucky. A few people helped me to get clean and sober and I got more help through an anonymous 12-step program. Today I live a more sane life as a recovering alcoholic, free from drugs and alcohol.

I'm so glad that I've had the opportunity to express myself in this article and in the one it follows. I find my life is fulfilled when I'm able to share my experiences, and sharing helps me express who I am. For me, identity is not only about the personal discoveries, but the expression of them as well -- the action that follows the discovery. I hope three years from now I'll have another story to tell.

So identity is the theme. Charles Sasaki, our editor spent one night trying to feed me with ideas and insisted that I write an article for this quarter's newsletter. He also fed me half of a piece of New York Cheesecake and a cup of Darjeeling Black tea. Too bad the feeding ended there.

Identity is a huge topic. A person is made-up of interactive identities where each identity holds president at a particular point in time. I'm a homosexual. I'm a Vietnamese Homosexual. I'm the youngest child in my family, twenty-five years old, Tiger/Scorpio, first and only college drop-out in my family, first to use a hairdryer and hair spray in my family, was voted as the shortest stud in both ninth and twelve grade, a controversial/trouble maker in the Vietnamese Community, a Vietnamese Homosexual. There's more, but lets move on.

Being Vietnamese and a homosexual are contradicting identities. Some of my relatives still refuse to believe that I'm gay because this illness can only be spread among the White American. Some Vietnamese critics blame me because I am somewhat Americanized and therefore self-brainwashed to an extreme where I would try to prove my liberalism. Others think I "read too much", whatever that mean. Being Vietnamese is equivalent to being a typical Conservative Republican. You are supposed to create this happy family image, raising well-mannered children that major in Electrical Engineer if they're boys and Pharmacy if they're girls, communist haters, and please don't talk about substance abuse, domestic violent and SEX. Of course not all Vietnamese families are like this. Although the mentality of the majority lean towards the cookie-cutter lifestyle.

I "came out" to my mother a year and a half ago. We were at Alki Beach watching the sunset. As I told her "Con la nguoi dong tinh luyen ai" (I'm a homosexual), my voice and hands trembled. She asked what exactly a homosexual was. I told her that being homosexual meant that two same-sex individuals were in love and attracted to each other. This idea did not exist in my family's mind or the people I grew up with. I was raised in a very "straight" world doing lots of "straight" stuff. Two years prior to my "coming out", I didn't even know where Broadway was. I even lost my virginity to a girl I met in college.

From many years of experimenting, exploring, and learning, it all lead-up to this one evening sitting next to my mother before a beautiful scenery. Sex is a taboo subject. As I was explaining myself, I tried to focus on the emotional loving aspect of having a gay relationship. Then she asked me if I had ever had sex. I didn't know what to say. I hesitated, partly because of embarrassment, but mainly because I didn't know whether I should tell her about the two girls I slept with during my first year in college or the many men since then. I simply answered, "Yes" hoping she wouldn't ask more. She looked straight ahead then exhaled. I felt her frustration, confusion, and disappointment as tears rolled down my face. We talked for the next two hours and then went home.

My mother is a strong, intelligent, kind-hearted woman. Since that evening, my mother has continuously showed me her acceptance, understanding, love and support. She also stood-up for me when my aunts and uncles expressed their disapproval towards me. She talked to me about Mathew Sheppard's case. She went to my first Seattle Men Chorus concert wearing an "Ao Dai", a Vietnamese traditional dress. She even worked with me on my Newsletter educating the Vietnamese community about gay issues.

I am very fortunate to have such a wonderful mother. But nothing comes free. It takes hard work from my end as well. I shared my thoughts and feelings with my mother where not many Vietnamese dare to do with their parents. I actively create a learning and growing environment for the both of us. The mistakes that I see most from Gay Vietnamese people is that they take things for granted and expect too much from their family. Understanding and respects are earned through time. It does not exist just because they are your family. "Coming out" to the people you care about is not a one-time thing. It is a process that people need to be involved in and it takes hard work to maintain the effort. I feel that it is my responsibility to make my family understand this issue.

One good thing about being the youngest is that my family doesn't have too many expectations for me. I didn't have to be a doctor, lawyer, engineer, etc. I can pretty much be myself. I don't need to have kids either since I have two older brothers to carry on the family name. However, I want to have kids one of these days. Two would be perfect. I want to give my children all the things that I did not have when I was a child. I like my kids to learn about sharing and receiving love unconditionally the way I've learned from my family.

I turned twenty-five last November. Pressure for getting a boyfriend is stronger than ever before. I guess because I've never had a romantic relationship with a man before, not to mention I've been a abstinent for two years all in the name of waiting for Mr. Right. It's been frustrating, but I don't want to date just anybody that crosses my path. If I just dated anybody, I'd be labeled as a slut. My extended family won't take my gay relationship seriously if I date too many people. I've been told already that a gay lifestyle has no future and only short-term. The rebel blood in me wants to prove them wrong but at the same time I have to acknowledge reality. I haven't seen many happy and stable gay couples.

A role model is very important and desperately needed in our gay Asian Community. That's why I feel it is essential for us to "come out" to our loved ones. "Coming out" is one of the most powerful statements that any gay individual can make. The younger generations need to know that there are people out there like them who went through what they are going through. My generation is the first Vietnamese generation to take this big step. We must not only "come out" to our family and friends, we also need to "come out" to our ethnic community and our gay community that Gay Asians exist in. We need to demand our right to exist and be equally respected in the world.

"Chopsticks"

"You hold your chopsticks the wrong way!"
my uncle likes to scream at me
while he attacks the chicken
and gnashes his teeth
ripping meat from bone
click clack clicketing
his fake ivory weapons
waving them maliciously in my face.

I hold my chopsticks the wrong way
my mother likes to inform me.
Not the way she does it
stern, cold, mechanical
calculating every move.
She likes to manipulate
her red rigid rods
making them flip
                            flop back and forth
snatching up shrimps
and popping them into her mouth
like candy.

I am uncertain, fingers fumbling
Hands shaking as I pass a dumpling
manoeuvre and drop, into his open mouth
"You hold your chopsticks perfect,"
my boyfriend whispers gently.
I smile at my success.

An Identity Development Model

Ok, so maybe you didn’t exactly love college. Too bad. If you had a gay Asian Professor, he’d have wanted you to see this. It’s a model to explain the stages that people pass through in life when encountering a culture that’s different from the one they’re initially most familiar with. Does it make sense to you as a gay Asian? Does it apply to your growing process?

Pre-encounter: Fears about cultural difference, lack of awareness, desire to conform, oppresses others for perceived difference

Encounter: First contact with the new culture, curiosity, begin to formulate and ask questions about difference

Immersion: Some participation in the new culture, development of personal relationships in a new community

Internalization: Acceptance of difference, affiliation with the new culture and its community

Commitment: Social activism, a desire to transcend stereotypes and oppression, questioning of presumptions

2000 - Y2K - Year 4697

Calendar of Events

Young Asian Men’s Study

YAMS is a program of the Young Asian Men's Study which addresses the unique concerns and perspectives of queer Asian men in their late teens and early 20s. Our goal is to create a safe and supportive space where we can examine issues important to us like society, family, relationships, and culture.  We are also here to provide peer support and opportunities to socialize with others like ourselves.

YAMS is looking for young queer Asian men in their late teens and early 20s who want to make a difference.  Whether you are interested in becoming a leader in our community; helping and providing support for others; or speaking out about what you believe in, YAMS is the place for you.  Bring your unique perspectives and experiences and help build a stronger young queer Asian community in Seattle.

Q&A Membership is Cool

Annual membership includes a sexy Q&A t-shirt, admission to Q&A events, annual subscription to Mochi Balls, monthly event and activity notification, and discounts to some activities. For more information about membership, leave a message at (206) 264-5518.

Send this form with a $10 check payable to "ACRS" for one year’s dues to Q&A, P.O. Box 14153, Seattle, Washington 98114.