Personal Convictions

Yesterday there was a seminar for kuchus. Of a sudden the gay community in Uganda is moving by leaps and bounds. They are organising. We are organising, and the impetus is coming from us.

Kuchus are like kuchus everywhere. We are what we are. Gay, and fun loving. We are more likely to attend a party than go to a gay pride event. And organising in Uganda has been plagued by secrecy and the fact that many people fear coming out and embracing their sexuality. Too many constraints, which apply to me as well.

But a leadership is emerging. It is under pressure. But it is genuine, as opposed to many who have been out shouting when in actual fact they are not kuchus!

I was not able to attend the seminar. But I had a personal renaissance in thinking which has been buoying me on since yesterday.

I sat down to read a lot of 'medical' literature about sexuality. You know medical literature. Tough words, incomprehensible meanings which one has to master. An insistence on exactness of meaning which beats less science oriented thinking. I accessed the 'emedicine site' and searched on sexuality. Read three articles 'Sexuality: Gender Identity', 'Sexuality: Sexual Orientation' and 'Homosexuality'.

After I had swam through the words and oriented myself and come up for air, I was exhilarated. I mean, all this stuff was out there and I knew it, but I did not really know it!!!!

I wanted to understand more, and tackled 'Homosexuality' on Wikipedia. And that gave me a wealth of information that I found personally enlightening.

I knew all these things. But in an abstract way. Maybe I was due refreshment on my self knowledge as a homosexual. Maybe it is the fact that, even though we do not sense much overt hostility the internalised level of attack on our selves as homosexuals is considerable, and that once in a while I want to read, to refresh myself on what I am.

I found myself singing. It reminded me of the day that I affirmed myself as gay. I did not tell anyone. I just said it aloud and stopped hiding something which was so glaringly visible to my mind. And I was so deliriously happy that it buoyed me on for more than a year!

Yesterday, I could not help telling my lover about it. I even told him that I do not want to hide anymore. I felt like climbing the minaret of the Old Kampala Mosque and singing that I am gay, a homosexual!

Caution. I had to caution myself. There are medics who believe the homophobia. There is the case of the head of the Islamic Medical Association in UK and of course Bush's Surgeon General nominee at the moment. Maybe their minds can be changed. But it is great to sweep the mind with the refreshing clarity of science. And to know that science does move people, especially doctors.

And something else. If I am to come out, which I want to do as sensationally as possible, I have to tell my relatives first! I owe it to them not to hear it on radio or TV.

Tough thing to do. But then I will be able to sign this blog in my names. Not as …

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