London Pride 2009

This is my second gay pride in London. So not much excited as last year. But it was nice to see diverse groups marching for the pride and the big show in Trafalgar square. Here is a youtube video of this years londons pride.

Bangalore Pride 2009

I attended the Bangalore Gay Pride two weeks back and it was nice to see more and more young people who are cool about being gay in Bangalore. I feel odd to hold posters OUT and PROUD as I feel very normal to be gay in Europe. But I know that it is imporant to creat he awareness.There were some people in drag and there was many guys from the IT companies in Bangalore. With the recent legalizaation of homosexuality I am hoping there will be more people who will be out and comfortable next year.I am thinking about going back to India after 5 years where I can live a life with equal rights and respect. As of now I like the openess in europe where I have equal rights and a big gay scene. The gay rights movement in India should be careful about showing a positive image about the community instead of blindly following the gayprides in the west. Many gay people in europe and america has started thinking that if gayprides are creating a positive image as some of the groups are hot muscle men in underwear promoted by different bars and clubs. I love them. But dont want the entire pride to be occupied with them. It is important that diverse sections of the community to be represented . Sexual workers and transgenders are discriminated the most in India. That is the reason more people from those community take part in the pride in India. But it is important to show the diversity to create the awareness that we are every where instead of creating stereotypes. May be groups from different states showing their culture like hot mallu men in kathakali dress :). Also we need the colourful people to make it interesting. For that people should come out and be part of the pride rather than complaining that they dont represent the people in the parade. This years london pride there were groups from different companies like british airways , military , ambulance services, firemen, london tube employees , different human right groups , NGOS , football club, soccer club, different religous groups, swimming club along with dykes and leather men. Will post the pics from the pride soon. By the way I was in some of the tv news about the pride march. Hope my distant relatives see that so that they dont bother me too much about marriage. I am tired of questions from my relatives about marriage this time when I attended my cousins wedding. Everyone is ready to find a nice bride for me.All my close relatives know for the last five years and they become comfortable about me and my partner.

Happy Pride Week

I am happy to celebrate gay pride in Bangalore as the world is celebrating gay pride in many cities. Last year India celebrated gay pride in 4 major cities (Bangalore, Mumbai, Delhi and Calcutta )which helped many gay people in India comfortable about their sexual orientation. For some people gay pride is like celebrating christmas and newyear and for some it is about creating awareness as gay people are still discriminated in families , schools and at workplace. For me it is both.When I attended Newyork gay pride in 2006 where 750,000 people attended , I felt I was not alone. I realized I was gay at the age of 15. But I was never comfortable talking about it till the age of 26 when I first attended the gay party in Mumbai where around 400 people attended. After that I never looked back. Now attending gay parties and gay prides in big cities like Newyork , Boston , Amsterdam , London, Berlin I have seen more gay people than the entire population of Kerala which made me comfortable about myself. And I feel we have to continue to show the diversity in the community to help people get comfortable about themselves and focus on their strengths to become role models who can make an impact on the society. In Kerala itself many lesbian couples comit suicides because of the society. This can be avoided by only creating more awareness and gay prides play a significant role in creating awareness.

I have seen posts by gay people who dont like gay pride because of the presence of drag queens and leather man. I am not into leather or drag but I have friends who are into drag and into leather. People are unique and have different strengths , preferences and lifestyles. It is important to understand that than being selfish. And strict laws need to be placed against child abuse and non consentual sex.
I feel gay people who cannot respect other gay people are selfish as they think only about themselves without understanding what others are going through in their life. It is sad that people going through the straight bigotry has to again go through gay bigotry which impacts the youth . I have seen gay people from very moral families who get into hustling and drug addiction because of their family rejected them.Gay community is very diverse. Instead of making the hate comments , people has to come out and show their diversity. The gay prides in bigger cities has started to show the diversiy in gay community. There are employee groups from big companies like IBM, JP Morgan , Google and there are groups representing military man, sailors , swimming clubs, different NGOS , football clubs, walking club , religous organizations, schools and there are subcultures in the gay community like leather and bear man. It is the drag queens and transexuals who were there to protest during the stonewall time. And gay prides without dragqueens will be like a protest march and boring. Gay pride is for people who like to celebrate and have a good time and for creating the awareness on diversity in the community and get equal rights and respect for people.

Trip to Kerala with Don in Feb 2009

As promised I am posting the pictures from the last trip to Kerala with Don. The top left one is near to Cherrai beach - one of the upcoming beaches in Kerala. We went in a fishermans boat to the sea. The second one is in Thattekad bird sanctuary. We went with my brother in laws and cousins and partied there but didnt see any birds :). The bottom left one is the Varkala beach. One of the best beach in Kerala. And the last one is from Samudra beach in Kovalam. The fisherman is going to put the fishing net in the sea. I loved Varkala beach than Kovalam. The view of the cliff with the beach is very beautiful.

Last 3 months update

It is long time I posted updates after coming to India. I spent 10 days in london before coming to india. One day I went to XXL and partied high. Then got sick . Another bad month. Someone intelligently robbed my overcoat in GAY Bar in london. It looks like a thief racket is happening there as we couldnt do anything.. When two of us went outside , a guy came and spoke to my friend. During that time two other guys came and took the jacket and left. It looks like it is happening there frequently as they have written beware of thieves. I already lost my leather jacket from a bar in rotterdam. It is nothing compare to the 3 cycles stolen from a classmate of mine in 6 months.

On the way to India , Air France robbed me of 230 euros for overweight. I was able to board from London. I miss the flight in Paris and had to stay overnight there. Next day they charged me on my checkin luggage for overweight. Couldnt do anything I was alone. This is the tactic used by them to make money in recession times.

Reached India and immediately went to Mysore with family and ended up getting a viral fever. Attended the new year gay party in Bangalore which was pretty boring compared to the weekend parties I had in UK. But it was nice to catch up with old good as you friends. Then went to Kerala and met most of the relatives. Good that now noone ask about marriage as most of my relatives came to knew about our relationship after my last visit with Don. Some ask and I ignored as I didnt want to have unnecessary stress on me. Slowly they get the message.

I asked Don to come to India as it was the perfect time for him to take a long vacation. He lost his mother and he was feeling lonely and sad. His mom asked when we were getting married just after connecticut passed same sex marriage.

This time Don was more comfortable with my family. We went for a one day trip with my brother in laws and cousins. Spent two weeks in Kerala with family. Also visited Kovalam and Varkala. After that we went to North India , visited Shimla , Delhi , Jaipur and Agra. Then went to Goa. Initially plan was to stay in Goa for 3 days. We loved Goa very much that we stayed there for 10 days . I took my favourite bullet and explored both South and North Goa. Will blog in detail about the trip soon. This time Don could really get the feel of India , travelling in trains and buses. We got food poisoned once and finally ended up with a viral fever again. Now Don is gone back to US. I am hoping to get my H1 Visa renewed and be back in US soon. Wish me all the best. I hate the unequal laws in US for same sex couples. hope things will change soon with Obama.





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Peace - Is it possible ?

World Peace - is it possible.

Many recent news articles has upset me starting with the Mumbai terror attack. Then frequent riots between marxist and RSS in Kerala and both the parties trying to blame each other and finally the acts of extremismt from the Hindu fundamentalists like Sri Ram Sena who were attacking young women in the name of Indian culture for going to pubs.Another Hindu extremist organization has requested young Hindu people not to make friendship with Muslim and Christian youth. It felt like another Taliban is arising in India. The good news is Indian youth is coming up against all these fundamentalists through internet.With the supreme court and the government taking proper action to protect the youth from these extremists on Valentines day , I felt like it is becoming more safer to live here. Everyone has the right to follow their religous or cultural beliefs or liberal thoughts. But it shouldnt reach a stage that people impose their beliefs on others like the Talibans do. Everyone has the right to live their way without affecting others. Living in a developed country last 4 years I always felt free to voice my opinion and live my life. Still it is a long way for India to reach that level in terms of human rights for everyone.Expecially with the current political system and beaurocratic system , things are changing very slowly. For any issue each party is trying to blame the other parties for political gain than thinking of the development of India.

If we need to get a work done from the government office in India ,still we need to use political influence or higher contacts. So most of the ministers time is spend on satisfying the needs of the people who has power and money. Only people with money and contacts can live a good life. This needs to be changed. People need to use the internet to anonymously blog about the corruption officers. If we can get rid of corruption , the money can be used for providing security of the country.


Other things which upset me are the continous fight between Westerners and Asians on a personal level. I can see that in newsarticle , Business Week , Bschool forums and the most recent ones was the discussion forum on oscar awards website. Asians are upset because of the discrimination based on colour and colonization which happened 100 years ago and Western people are upset because of the asians are taking their jobs. Some of the things are difficult to forget.But we need to forget and look forward for a better world. With hatred peace can never be achieved. It is important that people stop remarks on a personal level. There is no place for stereotypes in a global world. There are good and bad people everywhere irrespective of race , religion and country. People who work hard grow. People need to forget the past and learn to treat everyone as a human being . Everyone has the right to follow their cultural and religous beliefs if it doesnt affect others . So stop making those remarks and use that valuable time for promoting peace in the world.

Finally done with my MBA

Finally I am done with my MBA. Many good and bad memories and good learning experience. Some of them I wish I could forget. One of the main reason I decided to do my MBA from a top school is that my family could be proud of me instead of worrying about my relationship which is not accepted in our hypocritic society. The degree is for people who just see a value in a degree. I feel anyone can achieve it if you are focused put a good effort. For me the international and learning experience counts more than the degree. It was a lot of sacrifice by me and my husbear to live a separated life for one year. We had a wonderful and happy life before my MBA. I dedicate my MBA to my family and my friends and my husbear who supported me on achieving this.

I had some bad moments in Rotterdam. But it was a great learning experience as I could understand more about life.I was happy to get out of Rotterdam. It was a big mistake to come to Holland thinking that rotterdam will have a nice gay life. But it was one of the boring place to be for gay students. I applied for exchange as I wanted to get out of rotterdam. That is how I ended up in Manchester , even though I had to tell lot of other reasons to convice the interview committee. I made some good friends from the exchange program.Manchester is a great city to be in if you like the young student and party atmosphere. We watched some Manchester City and Manchester United matches.It has a great gay life with 15 minutes walk from the campus. Around 20 -25 bars were around the Canal street area.The city is very open as I saw lot of transexuals and crossdressers walking through canal street with complete freedom.
But the people in Manchester seem to be very rough , aggressive .Also UK seems to have more racism compared to other places in Europe and America.I didnt find that much in the bear community.
There is an active women and gay rights group in Manchester University. I went for the welcome party organized by the LGBT support group in the university and was surprised to see young students in 18s are very cool about their sexual orientation. It is important for all schools to have a similar supportive environment where students dont have to fear about their sexual orientation and completely focus on their studies. Expecially for international students ,it helps a lot to have a group of friends to go out together. I use to get bored in Holland always going out alone to the gay bars. I made some nice straight friends.But I always have to watch my words as I find people were not that comfortable about it.

I like to explore all the different experiences.Once I been to a transexual bar. I was just dancing with a beautiful transexual lady to be part of the fun. But she thought I was hitting on her. I was lucky I could get out of it quickly and she understood.

India Governments bigotry and ignorance

Check out the article on NDTV . Gay sex immoral, Centre tells Delhi HC .Government doesnt have the right to force gay people to get married and love women if they dont have attraction towards women.How can we call it democratic country when the fundamental rights of 50 million people are ignored and treat them as criminals.

When countries like Holland, Spain and UK has laws to prevent homophobia , Indian government is trying to increase homophobia in India. Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code is introduced under the British colonial rule in 1860. In UK , law was changed in 1967 and same sex couples has the right to wed in 2005 'Gay weddings' become law in UK . But the politicians make ignorant statements ignoring the fundamental rights of more than 50 million people in India. Many medial associations has proved that homosexuality is not a choice. Check out the detailed info on sexual orientation from American Phschological association

20 years ago America had the same issue and the spread of AIDs has forced them to accept homosexuality and take positive steps to create safe sex awareness among gay men. In India gay men get married and have unsafe sex meeting people through chat sites . Then they pass the disease to their innocent wife and passed onto new born babies. All these happen because of our hypocritic society and the law which criminalizes homosexuality. When people resist of introducing sex education in schools because of morality issues , they dont understand how it affect the ignorant people in india.I have gay friends in India who got AIDS because of ignorance and not able to connect with support groups which create awareness on safe sex. In western countries students at a young age are aware of safe sex because of the sex education taught in schools. Right now women cannot walk in a street in India alone because of people talking about morality and making misuse of it. But they say it immoral when gay people have sex with consent.

And homosexuality is not a western phenomena. Research says that around 5 - 10% of population are gay irrespective of religion ,race or location. Indian gay people get married because of the stigma associated with the homosexuality.They dont have attraction to the opposite sex and cause fights in family because of hatred in life of not able to live the way they can. And the kids grown up in those families get affected because of the unhappiness in their parents life.

Many educated indians who are lucky like me got the chance to go outside of the country and live a gay life. If Indian government continue this attitude for getting the votes of the ignorant people ,it will cause frustration in many indian educated youth and cause another brain drain.I cannot think of living in India for another 10 years because of the hypocritic society we have.India is going through time AMerica was going through 20 years back. I met many gay people in theirs 50s in States who got married and later divorced and decided to live their life.

Independence Day , One world and Queer Azaadi

Last Friday it was 61st year of Indian Independence. It was good to celebrate getting the independence from British and show the Indian pride. But showing country or religous pride or even gay pride should not a reach a level bashing other countries or religion or straight people. I see even educated people started bashing other countries and religion because of the previous history.If you are beaten up by a Turkish guy for being gay , it doesnt mean that you need to hate other Turkish people because of one bad person. If we keep some of the incidents happened in the past and hate the entire community because of some bad people in the community,we never reach a world with peace . It is time for every community to work together to fight against terrorism. Peace is not possible with keeping hatred in mind.

All this terrorism is happening because of some politicians and religous fundamentalists trying to take advantage of ignorant people . All religion has the basic principle to give love and respect to others. But is many religous people are following the basic principles?I like the existence of religion as it helps young kids to grow up with good beliefs and develop a good society.
But these days are the religous people teaching the right things to the youth ? Last year I happened to hear the talk given in an SNDP ( Sree narayana Guru Dharma Paripalana) meeting. The person talks about the power achieved by NSS group and how Ezhava community should unite and work as a community so that they also have the same power. This was from an educated person. A kid growing up hearing those words along with having the Ezhava pride will also learn to have hatred towards other caste. I was surprised to hear those words from a group named on famous social reformer from Kerala - Sree Narayana Guru who preached "One God, One Religion , One Caste for Men " It is just not Ezhava community. All religous leaders and political leaders are giving talks which along with creating pride is also creating hatred to other religion or nationality. They should also teach to respect other religion and other nationalites. Just because being born in a different religion or nationality , we cannot hate them. If I was born in their place, I will have their relious belief and political belief. I am lucky to come across people from different nationalities and religion and learned to respect their differences. That is one of the greatest advantage of doing an international MBA. If you are going to work in a global world , we have to learn to respect others differences and create a positive environment for everyone to help them contribute with complete energy.

But I am happy to see many young generation are trying to create a world with peace. I was happy to find the India Pakistan Friendship club . I feel peace cannot be achieved by keeping hatred in mind. Even I been to the South East Asian parties in Newyork where Indian and Pakistanis dance together like brothers and sisters.


Back to the subject. Even after getting Independence , many people in India still dont have the complete freedom because of the section 377 , the law forced on India by the British colonial rule.Now even the UK has same sex marriages. But even after 61 years of Indian Independence , this law is not abolished in India giving rights to police to harass and blackmail gay people in India.

I was excited to read about the Queer Azadi march in Mumbai day after independence day to fight for the rights of many gay people in India. Kudos to the Mumbai people. But I was embarrassed to hear that they were asking for British to apologize for sodomy after 61 years of independence. I can really understand of asking to apologize for the wealth they have taken from India.But the existence of section 377 even after 61 years of indian independence, I will blame our society and law who still dont accept homosexuality in the 21st century instead of blaming the British after 61 years.It is my thoughts as a global citizen of the world. For me it doesnt sound right to blame them after 61 years of independence.

I saw the pics in the facebook group of my friends and it looks like there was a huge crowd for Queer Azaadi march. Check out the pics here Pics .
The difference I see from the Amsterdam parade is that there is no boards stating I am queer or I am gay as it considered normal in Holland. In Holland it is more like a cultural festival and celebration like our independence day , freedom from homophobia.


These days more acceptance and awareness are there with the young population in the bigger cities in India. In another 10 years , India will have the biggest gay pride march in the world.Based on the gay statistics,if we estimate 10% of the people are Gay ,Indias gay population will be more than the 12th largest populated country in the world.

I was upset to see the comments of many ignorant Indians when times of India published an article about Ramdoss support to legalize homosexuality.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/opinions/3342815.cms

India has to come out of the closet. It is not a Western Phenomena.In Kerala itself many gay people have sex. But they get married and try to live a regular life because of the hypocritic society. For the ignorant people , please check the information from the most recognised phschological association in the world about homosexuality.
http://www.apa.org/topics/sorientation.html
Times of India. Thanks for doing a great job for supporting the cause of 100 million people in India.

As per statistics 5 to 15% people are Gay or Lesbian everywhere in the world. Since it is more accepted in the Western countries people are more open there. In Indian society since it is not accepted many gay people has a secret gay life or immigrate to countries where it is accepted . Last 4 years I lived in many places outside India where I met many gay Indians. They immigrate as they dont have the freedom and acceptance in their own country. An effort by a leader to support the cause of 100 million people should be appreciated.

Acceptance of homosexuality has many benefits to India. Spread of HIV can be reduced by being able to reach out gay people in India about Safe Sex awareness program .Young gay people in India doesnt have much awareness on safe sex and many get married and have a secret gay life. When in the pressure of having a secret life, they dont worry about using a condom . Also sex is a stigma ,people are not comfortable to ask their partner to use a condom.

The second is brain drain of Indian gay people going to countries where homosexuality is accepted can be reduced. Only the educated of the gay people get a chance to get out of India because they dont get freedom in their home country.I dont think of moving back to India as the rights and acceptance I get here wont be in India for another 5 years.

Third Indias population growth can be reduced and many orphans will get a life as many gay people like to adopt and live a normal family life.

Fourth benefit is India is losing many tourist money because of the section 377. Many gay foreigners , expecially gay couples and gay families with kids are afraid to visit India even though there are many tourist attractions in India. Gay Travel Market is a big market because of the non disposable income they hold as DINK (Double Income No Kids).In US itself the market is more than 500billion.Check out the article on Gay Market from Commercial Closet Many countries national tourism board are trying to attract gay people by having a dedicated website targeting gay travellers.

Fifth is the conflicts in many families can be reduced. Mostly if the gays and lesbians are forced to live a married life ,it will create conflict among partners who doesnt have affection towards each other and will also affect the kids growing up in a family where there is no affection between parents.