Saturday, November 22, 2008

The closet

In a kuchu hang out, last Friday-

Was seated with a group of friends. Kuchus. None out and out, all of us closeted. You know, there are always some of us who are more gay and flamboyant than others. But, birds of a feather, we flock together.

A beautiful evening it was. A lot of members, fleeting, flirting in and out. One a bi friend. Married, for the ‘usual’ reasons. A friend of his noticed him in our group. Called him aside and asked, ‘Do you know that those guys are gay?’

Correct answer would have been, ‘Yeah, how did you know?’ or, ‘Yeah, want an intro?’

Or, something to the effect, ‘No, but does it matter?’

Our friend, because he is gay and in the closet, panicked. Decided to disappear, run away from us, without a bye. Spoilt his evening.

The closet. We end up hurting ourselves more by the self imprisonment.

How did the dude know we are gay? Bet none of us told him. And he might have suspected, but, did he have any proof? Like in one of us sleeping with him?

Hilarious. The guy was of course concerned about the ‘corrupting’ influence of our association with his friend. But, even the guy he was seated with at his table was a kuchu! And, his friend, though married, with a child, is kuchu.

Anyway, life as it is. Interesting how we build our walls of lies all round us. And comfortably live in those recesses of hypocrisy.

Before we hit them down, remember the story of the trans. These lies are necessary for survival.

Sober thought.




GayUganda

5 comments:

Leonard said...

I remember we almost always used a coded language when I lived at my Fraternity during College 40 years ago...the others didn´t have any idea what we were talking about as they overheard, listened ¨in¨ to one side of telephone conversations or even, on some occasssions were in a group of us who were double dating (little did they know who was dating whom)...there were 10 of us in my Fraternity of almost 100 members and nobody ¨knew¨ anything until one older member, who was Gay and the most obvious of the crowd, thought he was ¨doing good¨ by sacrificing one of his Gay brothers by turning him in...it was downhill after that for several, the Franternity kept a lid on it because they didn´t want ANYONE to think they were Gay and although I was a ¨suspect¨ they were willing to keep me as a member as they kicked out others one by one by way of a witch hunt (like Orombi is attempting to pulloff)...that is, until I packed my bags and disappeared and said, adios...I felt GREAT and I didn´t look back...interesting, some of my best friends and ¨brothers¨ never spoke to me again as we´d pass one another on campus...I really did disappear! Years later I ran into the betrayer at a Gym when I was working out and he was standing on the sidelines...he came up to me and said ¨I´m so sorry I ruined all of your lives¨...I said, ¨you didn´t¨ and kept working out...I heard he died of AIDS within the year but I often thought of the REAL friendships that he had tossed away.

Ugandan girl said...

hmmmm..being in the closet is an interesting thing..though sometime its much better staying if you weigh your options and realise that for the people that you love and care about its better to be where you are at.....but i must say your friend bloting on you like that ...dude that wasnt cool...xx

spiralx said...

Having to hide or worse, deny, some part of who you are is always damaging.
The good thing is the often amazing resilience of the many people who find a way to express or come to terms with it.
(And the number of parents who quietly allow it to be, is also pretty amazing!).

Anonymous said...

I agree with spiralx and just to add the number of parents AND friends that know but will keep quiet about and in their own way support you is what is amazing.

Yes we live in a homophobic society, but not everyone's a homophobe. That's at least one ray of hope.

Anonymous said...

Well, there has always been only one way to KNOW someone is gay -- and that happens only in bed!

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