Lovers in a Dangerous Time

Greetings from Guate. I know its been a very long while since I have written anything in my Victorian nights blog...mostly because I am currently very far from Victoria. However, here in Guate, curteousy of my roommate Steph, I have been regularly indulging in the general impetus for my Victorian nights blog. I have had many a Guatemalan night doing the same activity as I do in Victoria. However, rather than coming inside from my steps and writing in my blog, I return to my room after we are finished our choice movie of the night and collapse in bed and fall asleep pretty instantaneously. It's lovely. I had once sworn to a summer of detox...it lasted 8 days. Life happens.

But I digress. I have decided that I will try to update this blog more regularly with stories that are less appropriate for my other blog. I try not to censor this blog at all, while my Guatemalan blog address has been emailed to everyone from my family to my employers. And so...lovers in a dangerous time.

As all who are reading know, this has been a really intense year for me. Possibly the most intense ever. The intensity has centred around two themes: law school and the experience of my first relationship. The exerience of my first relationship came with a lot of extras that heterosexual people just don't have to deal with. Along with the general stress of it all, the experience entailed coming out to my extended family, various co-workers, and ultimately making the decision to just live "out" to everyone I know, and will know in the future.

Luckily, I live in Canada. In 2003, the government legalised same-sex marriage and in the course of doing so, shifted the nation's views on homosexuality. I'm not pretending that homophobia isn't still a huge issue, but there are some things that are now realities that never were before. I could have married my significant other if I we had conceivably made it that far. I got to walk down the street holding hands with my girlfriend. I could kiss her in public. We could make out in the bar, dance, and be a couple. I introduced her to my immediate family, and I was introduced to hers. My friends met her and were supportive of our relationship. I could talk to them about anything and everything, which I did, and they stood by me through my good decisions, hard decisions, and piss poor decisions. They helped pick up the pieces when my world came crashing down around me circa January.

How things have changed in a year. Instead of a 15 minute walk through downtown London, Ontario to work after a night with my lover, I have a 15 minute walk through the town of Rabinal, Baja Verapaz after a night of watching a movie and blazing with my housemate. Guatemala is a conservative country to say the least. What brought me here to work was the genocide of the Indigenous Mayan population. Racism and sexism are everyday realities, let alone mention any mention of alternative sexualities. Homophobia does not begin to describe the oppressive climate that exists everywhere outside of the capital. Before coming to Guatemala, I knew that my reality here would be that I would have to not tell the truth (read lie) about a lot of things. Every conversation here with a male involves a few questions right off the bat. Are you married? Why not? Do you have a boyfriend in Canada? Do you have a boyfriend here? In addition to lying, I knew I would have to deny an integral part of my identity for four months. Not only could I not tell the truth when answering the above questions, I could not fully be myself with the locals. I could not ask out a female if I thought she was attractive, nor discuss amongst the locals something that is now an important aspect of my concept of self.

Amongst the interns that were here and have since all returned to Canada, of course, no problem. It doesn't take long for a conversation to turn to something surrounding relationships or sex and I always am truthful about my orientation in that context. All of the interns that were here are awesome people. The two guys both had female partners to whom they were extremely committed, and the two female interns were single but spoke only of male exes.

(In this upcoming part, names have been changed, only out of respect for privacy I guess though its not likely that anyone that they know will ever read this blog.)

One of the interns, Kate, became really good friends with many of the locals, but was especially close with two- Sofia and Guillermo. Kate is a really cool person. She is very into truth, connecting with people, and living close to one's essence. Sofia and Guillermo are very outward looking Guatemalans; both are teachers, both are unmarried, though both still live at home. Both want more out of life than what Rabinal has to offer, but here family is extremely important and leaving is harder than we can imagine with our North American concept of family. So, Kate, Sofia, and Guillermo had become really tight friends. I knew that when it came time for the interns to leave, it would be really hard for both Sofia and Guillermo. I think its always harder to be left than to leave. At least when you leave, you are going on to do something new and exciting or returning to a place where you have a strong support network. If you are left, you're life continues on as per usual but without the beloved. Additionally, the place where you are left holds painful memories of the happy time that you spent together. The situation is more pronounced when there is a small chance of returning, at least for a long while, and expecially when the distance is so far, and the cost so prohibitive.

Sure enough, on Kate's last night (which was a night later than all the other interns because she was not ready to leave and did not want to go see the doctor in the capital), I went to the market with her where she met up with Guillermo. He didn't want to prolong their goodbye by chilling all night in the house. They embraced, said their goodbyes, cried (which in turn made me cry) and parted ways. It was impossibly sad. Back at the house, I chilled with Steph as Kate and Sophia chilled in Kate's room and packed. The next day, Kate left mid-day, and the rest of my week was very low key.

Life has been quiet since they left. I saw Guillermo and Sofia again a few days later at a good bye dinner for one of the Human Rights accompaniers, Thomas, who is working here, hosted by the Scottish woman who works in our office. Both Sofia and Guillermo were pretty sad though in good spirits. Sofia is naturally a fairly closed person and is not really into showing how she really feels, and Guillermo is a jovial guy with a gentle soul. I know that if it weren't for the language barrier, we would have been closer by the time the other interns left. As it was, I felt a connection with Guillermo that transcends language and I definitly had a crush on Sofia, who actually had set off my notoriously poor gaydar. However, that night she spoke of a guy that she used to see who is returning from Africa in July, and so my weak and distant hopes of her actually being gay were immediately stiffled. As we were all leaving, we knew we would be seeing each other again at Thomas's official good bye on Thursday, and we left our plans to see each other again at that.

So, this past Thursday I arrived at Thomas's and it was a small gathering but good company. Everyone was drinking away, and after a few more beer runs, it was clear that it was going to be one of those style nights. Guillermo and Sofia both seemed in decent spirits though a bit down still, and understandably so. Part way through the night, Sofia turns to me and says that we should chat a bit later. She was really casual about it, and I was like...yes, sure of course. So a little while later, we left the main table and a only a few feet away from everyone else, though drowned out by loud Spanish crooning, she says to me,

"So you must have realised what was going on between Kate and I."

Hold up. Wait just a second. We're in Guatemala. You're both straight. Sure, maybe I let stereotypes and my inherent disposition for wanting women I find attractive to be gay wander a bit into the thought that maybe, just maybe.... since she is a gym teacher, a former Guatemalan badminton champion, and on the night of a fiesta during my first week here she slept over in Kate's room because we didn't want her driving her moto home drunk. But no...no wait. We're in Rabinal, Guatemala.

I just kind of stared, with a blank look on my face for a second, and she repeated herself, likely because she thought didn't understand what she had just said in Spanish.

"You realised what was going on between Kate and I." Well holy shit fuck damn. Kate must have told her that I was gay and that if she needed to talk to someone about it, that she could talk to me.

I sympathetically nodded my head yes. Throughout our conversation she kept saying how special Kate was to her. She went on to say that it had been really really difficult for her since Kate had left, that she missed her so much, that she hadn't heard from her and that she had writen her email down a bit illegibly so she couldn't contact her. She spoke about how it's not common in Rabinal and asked me not to tell anyone. She kept saying how she knew I would understand. I asked her, if she didn't mind, whether this was her first relationship with a woman, and she said yes. I spoke briefly about my experience last summer, and yes, how I understood some of what she was going through. She said about the guy she was talking about earlier that she wanted nothing to do with him, that as far as she was concerned it was over, though he wanted to have a relationship with her. She spoke about how she didn't know if Kate would ever come back to Rabinal, and I tried only to offer what Kate had told me- that she wanted to come back in November, and that if anyone would come back of the interns that it would be Kate. I spoke little, but mentioned here and there that I'm sure it must be even harder not being able to ever show any signs that they were together, and not being able to speak to anyone she knows about it. I assured her that she could call me anytime she needed to to talk about anything, and gave her my email and phone number. We arranged to have dinner at some point next week, we hugged then we rejoined the party.

We both continued on as before, as carefree as we could, drinking and dancing, but at one point later in the night she turned to me and told me that they had met there, at Thomas's house, in January. And at another she pointed to her thumb, now void of where one of her rings used to be, and I asked if "algien especial", someone special, had it. At the end of the night, she drove me home and again I said call anytime.

On Friday, I awoke late in the morning, having decided the night before to take the day off. Steph was also home and asked me how the party was. Intense I said, and offered as the reason that one of the other guys got so drunk that he pissed himself, which was in fact true. I decided that I needed a little break from Rabinal, so I headed down to Antigua for the weekend to hang out with Jess and Douglas. Sofia called yesterday asking if we could hang out last night in my house. I apologized for my absence, but we concretely arranged to have dinner on Tuesday.

So much has been running through my head since Thursday. Yesterday was a heavy day to begin with- it marked a year of the night that Erin and I met (it coincides with a close friend's birthday if I need to offer an explanation of why I remember the date...), and after I got the call, I just turned to Jess and spilled everything. Jess, and Douglas for that matter, are super queer positive so it has been really awesome to Jess as a sounding board for all this

But really, can you imagine? Can you even imagine going through this? Sofia, on her end, never got to hold Kate's hand in public. She never got to kiss her, dance with her, be a couple in any way outside of closed bedroom doors. And I say closed bedroom doors because even at our house, when it was just the other interns and them, not once did I ever see them have even a lingering glance of adoration. I'm fairly sure they loved each other, and don't you just want to shout that from the roof tops? Sofia never got to introduce Kate to her family as anything more than a friend. They didn't get long weekends in bed together or trips together or to introduce each other to each other's friends as anything more than friends. Everything was secret and the cost of letting the secret out was huge. None of the other interns even knew. Brenda once told me that she suspected that Sofia might be gay, but never mentioned anything about Kate. Sofia is heartbroken, and has nobody to speak to, except me...and what if I hadn't told Kate I was gay? What if my Spanish really sucked? Sofia doesn't have anything close to the money that it would take to visit Kate in Canada, nor can she uproot her life and move there. She helps her grandmother sell candles every Sunday in a nearby town, she is on a cheerleading team, teaches at 4 schools, and her brother has a drug addiction that he is getting help with. Culturally, it would be really difficult to leave her family, and with the added circumstances of her brother, its basically impossible.

And as for Kate, what can she do? Is she going to return to live in Rabinal? Where they could be together without ever being able to build a life together. The simplist things that that would entail would be impossible. There isn't really such a thing as renting a place and having a roommate. They could never take out loans together to buy a house. They couldn't even pretend they were sisters for either purpose. If anyone here ever found out, I don't exactly know what the consequences would entail aside from the imposed cultural exclusion, but with the level of impunity that already exists here in Guate I don't doubt that gay bashing would go unpunished. And if she returns to visit, the pain of leaving again would rip off the scab of healing that both had acheived. They wouldn't get to have a long embrace or tears at the first sight of the other at the airport or bus terminal. I'm sure Kate didn't tell the others in order to protect Sofia, but as a person who was so into truth, I can't understand why she felt she couldn't confide in anyone at all. That is a huge secret to carry around for all those months. Kate was going back to Canada not knowing what she was going to be doing nor even in what city she was going to be living. She had just finished undergrad before coming to Guate. All of this would be really really hard for her too

So for both of them, their coming out is intertwined with this other story of cultural barriers that prevented them from being together as any heterosexual couple would have been. One half of the intercultural divide told them that it was not okay for them to be together. Both are heartbroken, left picking up their lives and continuing on as if they each lost only a good friend.

Evidently, my former feelings of having to deny an integral part of my identity are not completely founded. By living my truth within the circles where it was safe to do so, I could be a source of comfort and understanding for someone who needs it so much. In terms of human rights and what I am doing here, it makes me at once so so so grateful for having been born in Canada where I get to be gay everyday of my life without worrying about fundamental security while also feeling really sad that people like Sofia are so far away from ever having the ability to live here as I live there, and that that is the case for the majority of queer people around the world. Along my journey, it took the acceptance of the nation's leaders in legalising same-sex marriage to even make me think that it would ever be okay if it turned out that I was gay, and so I intensely admire the bravery of all those around the world who come to that realisation when their respective societies are forcefully telling them that its wrong, bad, sinful, and simply not okay. If you are reading this and you are straight, I hope this piece offered a nuanced way of relooking at what you carry around with your heterosexual priviledge. If you are reading this and you are not straight, I hope you have a refreshing reminder of how lucky we are to have been born in Canada. If, additionally, you are not out, I hope that this piece might offer you courage to live your truth or comfort in your struggle

This turned into something much much longer than I had envisioned when I began. 4 hours later, I must go to bed. I begin my journey back to Rabinal in 5 hours. Thank you to those who lasted to the end.

Rach
from one of the most beautiful Guatemalan nights I can recount to date, with a cloudless sky and a bright moon shining down on Antigua.