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[NQV] SF visit: 8/31/96 (10)
Saturday 8/31/96
(continued)
After a short break, the audience was once again split into groups.
I had originally wanted to stay and watch the videos in the workshop
"I got this way from eating rice: A collection of videos about queer
Vietnamese" since I've missed many (if not all of them) during their
rare appearance on the east coast (and only in New York and not even
in Boston!) And I've been curious to see first-hand the work of many
young Viet queer film-makers whose names, but alas not works, were
well-known to me (and many people on vn-gblf too), such as Trac Vu,
Nguyen Tan Hoang, Minh Nguyen, Tuan Quang Le, etc. Alas, I guess it
was not meant to be ("Vinh ddu'ng la` kho^ng co' duye^n ddu+o+.c xem
ma^'y ca'i video na`y," I groaned as anh LTTuan waved it off: "Ma^'y
ca'i ddo^` phim sex ddo' thi` co' hay ho gi` ma` xem, ai ma` muo^'n
xem thi` to^i se~ ddem ve^` cho xem ca? buo^?i cho cha'n tho^i!" :-)),
and as I was wandering about in the hallway, I was dragged into the
other workshop about "Embrace, Challenge, and Vision our Past, Present
and Future" facilitated by anh LTTuan, Clayton Long Chau, and Thuy Vu.
A quick glance at the ever so serious audience gave me the impression
of an expanded joint rap session for GVA and QAVA or something :-)).
Of course, upon the call of duty, it sure made more sense for me to
join this workshop, which seemed to serve as a fittingly stimulating
high point of my day at the conference, and needless to say I enjoyed
it immensely.
As everyone sat around in a circle, the worshop dispensed with the
usual meaninglessly vague general self-introductions around the room.
While saving on time, in some way, this put "outsiders" like myself
(even though I must have know over half of the people in the worshop
already) at a slight disadvantage in getting better acquainted with
the other people who seemed to have known one another well enough to
generate a slightly "cliquish" (if I may use that discredited word)
dynamic among themselves in the course of the workshop. The workshop
facilitators, however, did introduce themselves in their introductory
remarks to set an agenda for sharing experiences and ideas about key
issues of concern to an effort at community building among gay Viets
as we envision our individual and collective situation and role for
ourselves in the future. So far so good. But then before anyone had
a chance to chime in to get the discussion rolling and draw in the
rest of the audience, we were awkwardly split into three groups along
rather arbitrary "generational lines" of "25 and under," "25 to 30,"
and "30 and over." Much to my surprise, nearly half (8 of 17?) of
the audience fell in the "30 and over" group, and I found myself in
the minority "younger" middle group (5 of 17?), and there were but
4 people in the "25 and under" group! Each group would talk among
itself, discuss, identify and summarize the main problems/concerns
particular to its present experience with respect to the three issues
of: coming out, relationships, and politics/community. Then at long
last, everyone would come together to list the responses on the board
and join in a general discussion (which once again proved to be too
short just as it was getting more spirited and substantial, and going
beyond sweeping generalizations, alas).
(to be continued)
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