Going HK for the week end

Finally my time in Asia is soon to be over for the moment (i hope & think). To 'celebrate' it, i go with a bunch of friends to Hong-Kong for a long week end.

Although, they are not gay, i'll be there with my boy friend and i plan to do one "gay places evening". Thus i checked a bit utopia and... wahoo! The city is just a bit bigger than Hanoi (8millions vs 6) but it's so full of gay or gay-friendly places! Even more than the Bangkok listing!

Anybody knows why? It could be it's a trendy place and many gays go there for working or leisure? Despite the chinese environment it's unofficially open?

A kiss in HK (it looked so cute to me... i hope i can do the same there ;-) )

In order to make this post a bit more informative, an edit:
It's easy and cheap to go HK from Hanoi though it's a long journey:
* Hanoi -> Bangkok at 9pm (perfect if you leave work at vietnamese hour like 5 pm), arrives at 10:45pm. There are some cheap hotel close to the airport
* Bangkok -> Macau: You got a flight at 7 am, arrives at 10am.
* Macau -> Hong Kong: there is boat transportation evry hour but i don't know the price yet.
* Bangkok -> Hanoi: flight at 6:45 am, arrives at 8:35, you can be at work at 9:30/10 am

Hanoi - Bangkok can cost around 100$ and Bangkok - Macau also 100$ which sum up 200$... if you take it at least 1 month in advance (imho). The hotel in Hong Kong look impressive but not as cheap as Vietnam or Thailand, the cheapest are around 60$/night.

You can also go direct to HK from Bangkok but the flight time is bad for short trips. Another possibility is to fly direct from Hanoi. There was a promotion at vietnam airlines for 350$ including 2 nights in a 3 stars hotel but you fly in the middle of the day... For non promotional, i have no idea but i would say at least 400$.

Formalities:

Most westerners can make their visa on arrival in Macau or Hong Kong. Vietnamese have to make it before departure and it can be such pain, especially if you are from a northern province... It seems that a visa for Hong Kong is sufficient to enter Macau (as it's not possible to do a Macau visa in Hanoi, according to my bf).

Gay cruise anyone?

 According to Fridae, the first gay cruise in Asia will take place on the 28 March. It interrogates me on several aspects.

First, are countries such as China, Vietnam and especially Singapore "happy" to receive such guests? It's no secrete that many asian countries have no homosexuals or just prosecute them if found.

Second, i'm still prudish (no sauna... yet >.<)  but i can guess that such a cruise would a huge and long  group sex party, isn't it? (Anyway i don't see the point of cruises)

Third,  omfg... it's 2 weeks without a post and you know the less you post the less you feel like that's why i post that though there was a lot of interesting news topics to discuss...

MSM Hanoi

A while ago i found a document called "MSM in Hanoi" and forgot about it but finally i read it (the doc can be found at unaids or some refs): it has not many useful or interesting information but some confirmations.

Men holding hands at a prevention meeting*

For the common people there is no gay people in Vietnam (or just the north? ^_^ ) or at least people never talk or think about that. The first point we see/feel is that there is no harassment on the plu community.

For example, whenever i go out with my bf we try to avoid places where he may meet friends but as long as we keep quiet no one would ever think of us as a couple. An even better example is a vietnamese girl friend of mine: she saw me many times with my bf and many times we left the party together and she still thinks we are both singles. In addition, she's been studying abroad for sometimes and probably know about plu.

The big disadvantage is about STD, particularly AIDS. It may be unknown but AIDS is spreading quite fast in Vietnam, at least in the north, and i'm sure of it as a friend was working on the subject last year. Thus AIDS prevention is developing, finally!, but only towards female sex workers... not for MSM or young people "being young“ or people having affairs etc.

As i usually say, Vietnam is moving very fast and i guess that this is very likely to evolve in less than 10 years, would it be early enough? No idea... It's so complicated to get any opinion about heomosexuality from my vietnamese friends or common people...

*: i stole (sorry 'bout that) the photo from a photographer blog. In contrary to what i say he took part in a project about MSM and aids prevention, his post about it is very very interesting and has some strong photos.

Classic situation

... I guess.

Friday night, it's party time with acquaintances and friends, while the latter know for me the former don't. No problem, the alcohol and the beat are flowing and two girl friends start to play with me.... dancing sensualy with me, opening my shirt then offering me drink by putting notes there (not down there!).

Great, great night! Although, a visiting friend of one of the girl doesn't seem to enjoy so much (coming from euro capital nights to Hanoi "evening parties" is not so hot).

The real good invited dj (Affecta)...compared to the resident one

The next day, i have plan for dinner with people like us, friends of my bf. The girl (C) sends me many sms to come to massage with her and her friend (D) then for dinner, then for party many times. I finish by answering "sorry i got a private life too" (more politely). Then i receive a sms from D like "let's get a drink without girls"... I check with C if i should understand correctly which she confirms but she cannot say much as she is with D and some friends.

As a kind  hearted person i make the two groups meet for some drinks at a normal place but it's getting late and just me, my bf, C and D go somewhere else to have a last drink and then get home.

And here comes the fun part:

I receive an sms like "sorry i didn't know the whole story about you, sorry for sending these message before".... OMG! He was interested in me!!!

That's a first time for me! I mean a westerner looking at me. Well, i learnt a few things:

• I am really innocent
• I am not that bad ??
• It's funny to piss girls (C wanted to get D for a few years now and because/thanks to me she knows she can't.)
• When i let my crazyness shines on the dancefloor some may like it \o/.
• Girls can get very bitchy when they know it's safe to play with a boy :D

Hook up online?

To meet guys there are a few places in Hanoi (bars, park, etc) as i previously wrote. The other alternative is on the web.

I found one main website to hook up online: gaydar  though gay.com (i tried...not so many guys) or gayromeo (never tried) but also vietsingle. I'm quite surprised by the last one as it is a "local only" dating site and it's operated locally. 

In contrary to what i know from field (bar) there are some lesbians too! Although after a quick check there is none from Ha Noi and most of them are from Saigon... what a shame for Ha noi! :p

Anyway, this post is just a little introduction for another one coming much later... :p

Rainbow flag

Did you know ...

what symbolyze the rainbow flag apart the "gay community"?

At  first i thought it was many "sexualities" exist and are equals (and so say wikipedia).

That's untrue, each color has a different meaning:

• pink means sex
• red means life
• orange means health
• yellow means the sun
• turquoise means arts
• indigo means harmony
• purple means spirit

Although, the current flag has only 6 colors (check wikipedia for the story).

A little more about colors

We all know that pink is often associated with being gay, because of the pink triangle for the na..zi, though it's quite incorrect now, especially asia. Indeed, according to gayboythailand (sorry i forget where it is) the asian color for gay "show off" seems to be purple (i'm gonna enquire about it with my bf but i think there is no semi-official gay sign). 

A bit more information about the rainbow flag, here, an abstract:

The first Rainbow Flag was designed in 1978 by Gilbert Baker, a San Francisco artist, who created the flag in response to a local activist's call for the need of a community symbol. (This was before the pink triangle was popularly used as a symbol of pride.) Using the five-striped "Flag of the Race" as his inspiration, Baker designed a flag with eight stripes: pink, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. According to Baker, those colors represented, respectively: sexuality, life, healing, sun, nature, art, harmony, and spirit. Baker dyed and sewed the material for the first flag himself - in the true spirit of Betsy Ross. 

Coming out status

I had two purpose with this blog:

1. An outlet: at the very beginning i wanted to make a personnal diary to express all the things i could not.
2. Share my (gay) life in Hanoi: later on, the first purpose was quite left aside and i wanted to talke how it is to be gay in such a city.

Recently, i have talked only about number 2 but today is number 1...mostly.

I am officialy-to-myself gay since around june 2007 while i met my bf in late July (yeah we both forget the exact date -_-). Actually it is thanks to a housemate: she told me "it's weird, usually, i don't get along with boys like these appart gays" and then i told her (and myself) that i may have some questioning on the subject. 

After being with my bf, quickly all the housemates have been told about it. The last one, a boy, could not understand what i said and though for a few days it was joke but then he understood. It was no problem COs as we were young westerners “opened to the world".

A bit later on, a new housemate arrived, a very posh and not very resourceful guy. I knew, it would be a problem but we were not getting along so we didn't met so often. Althoug, once we've  been at the nightclub at the same time, quite drunk, and he told me: 

"i have something to tell you..." (why we don't get along etc) 

so i answered him 

"Nice, me too i have something to tell you, i prefer boyz and i know you can't take it". 

His answer is memorable:

"No, You, you don't take that" (like to take drugs), 5 times in a row!

That is the worse reaction to my CO so far though i had no pressure for this one.

Later on (last winter), i finally decided to tell my best friend about it. I did it using skype late at night, it was not easy to say the words without seeing the person but finally it came out. His reaction was "ah ok" which is quite ok ;) but what suprised me is that he already had a MSM experience and it was his first time but it was not his type... I asked him not to tell our shared friends as i was not ready yet.

A bit before summer, a friend came to Vietnam and i decided to tell him though i knew if i tell him, most of my friends will be informed. After many tries, i finally succeed to say:

 "ok wanna have a drink after dinner" 

- "no i'm tired"

- "you are sure?"

- "yes i'm really exausted"

5min later

- " well i want to take a drink because i have something to tell you"

This time it was difficult because he was in front of me but finally i succeeded and he had the  "ah ok" reaction. After that he met my bf and we chatted a bit. He stayed one more week in Vietnam so i had this time to prepare my friends back home.

As often, i was lazy and i call just 2 before his coming back and the rest after that. All of them were surprised, but had the "ah ok" reaction, but not shocked and wished me"be happy together".

The final CO was eventually to my family. That was the most difficult and still going on...but may evolve toward a good end.

Today, i got the idea that it may be the time for me to start my COs with vietnamese people. Shortly, there are two (maybe 3) categories of vietnamese i know who i may do a CO.

Colleagues

When i say "colleagues" it is only the young ones that may be able not to kick me right away. I tried to do a few jokes like "well i'm not very good at getting a girlfriend so maybe i show go for boyfriend?", their answers were a big minute long silence. Although, i think the women may take it quite ok while i think the men will take it quite bad.

Friends

I don't have so much friends that are not my colleagues but they are more open minded people (in my opinion). Actually, according to my dear friend N., one of them, a girl, may have guessed already...too bad she's one of the few i'd like to try again *** with 0:-)

Why doing a coming out to vietnamese?

The first reason is that there is a lot of gossip about me (like anyone else though especially singles) and one includes a former "affair" (i use to try to date) with a girl. It's some time i don't think about her (Hey i've been with my BF more than 1 year now) but some people still think i'm depsaired about her.

Another reason is that i would like to be free to say "yeah i'm not single anymore" and "sure, i'll come with bf"...sweet but impossible i think.

The last reason is that it would such a great pleasure to make them understand "you liked me but i was sucking dicks...so what do you think now? Will you fuck up your mind thinking i was a just an asshole since the beginning or try to accept it?" ... that would be nice!

It's more likely not to happen anytime soon but stay tuned!

Backlash

I didn't play so much with boyz when i was single though once i met a specific guy. This guy was starving for sex and why especially? Because he's married! Yes, it's pretty common here, notably for more than 30 years old gay (i think).

Actually, i didn't really want to meet him but unfortunately he studied in my home country, speaks my mother tongue and guessed easily from a few hints where i work. Thus i agreed to meet.

He was not the kind of boy i like  (sissy but nasty)  but i was starving too... Plus he was back in Vietnam since 6 months and it seems he had no man since that and.... "oi troi oi".

Finally, i decided not to ever see him again (Hanoi is not full of boyz but there are more than a few :p).

What happend today?

As everyday, i was iddling reading some websites when 2 guests arrived! This guy and a friend!

 My colleague introduced them to me. The guy is a friend of the other one and has no reason to be here beside that (officially... unofficially i guess it's for me or to see some neat westerners :p). I think i blushed a little at first but then i played it cool, even some chit-chat with him.

Actually, since the day i met him i was afraid of him to come to my work but then nothing happened. I just wonder if he'll try to contact me again (IM, dating website, phone, ...)?

Sauna or not?

And when i speak about sauna i obviously speak about gay sauna!

Here's the fact:

I recently read on utopia, that there is a gay sauna in Hanoi! I even went there to check the surroundings of the place. It is located in a narrow and long alley, typically vietnamese. First it surprise me because you have the common life around. Second, it's quite discreet and really quiet, the front room is a moto parking (it was full last friday when i drove around there). It is also quite cheap (5$ i think).

(edit) address: Adam's Spa 92 Ngo (alley) Tho Quan, Pho (street) Kham Thien . They even have a website though i don't understand anything...

Will i go?

I think, i will go there... one day. 

• Why one day? 
  

I don't really to ask my bf to go there, i don't want him to see me as a pervert (that i may be one day :p).  When we talk he is someone who dislike the gay athmosphere (everyone knows everyone and had much "fun" with many / girly fashionned boyz etc). Finally, thanks to my confidante, i may ask him to go there with me. He and i would feel really uneasy there but it would be better for him to know that i go there and he is sure that i didn't do something bad there...

• Why going there?

I have some morbide curiosity about that kind of place, curiosity to know my "sexual comrades"! I really want to know if it is like i imagine (all that stereotypes) with people having fun anywhere or "just" a lustfull athmosphere!

Anyway i will keep my (so many) dear readers updated on that... but maybe i'll check another gay bar before (one of the nightlife places i told you before).