Impressions of a Conference,

Part I

The 5th ILGA Conference Bangkok: 

"The Phoenix Rising"!

March 2013

A most inspiring experience even though I attended only to support, assist and give feedback to the 3 person strong Phuket delegation, it felt like I got badly infected (again) with the LGBT-emanicipation virus!

NOTE: When you read this, know that this is a 2d and part even 3d version! Due to, uhum, a hick-up with my internetconnection while working online, for the first time ever I experienced a loss of more then 90% of what I had written, including pictures, etc.... So I do my best to restore as much as possible of my original thoughts put down BUT it also explains why my so called report of the conference is also somewhat late and maybe shorter and less colorfull then it could/would have been! 

This won't be a report of the conference, only an impression, and no doubt very incomplete at that, of a surprising 3 days in heat strikken Bangkok. Meetings from 9 am in the morning till 7 pm in the evening, 3 days in a row BUT very glad everywhere the aircons were working just fine because outside the temps were running close to 40 degrees. 

The Phoenix Rising

Next to opening and clos\ing of the conference, as well as the specific meetings for the membership of ILGA, which stands for International Lesbian and Gay Associations, of which most organisations active in/for the LGBT communities all over the world  are or can become member of. 

ILGA is organised not only worldwide BUT also by continent.

So these last days of March in Bangkok, the Asian membership was finally meeting again after the last conference had to be cancelled before it had even started due to fundamentalist violance  and intimidations aganst the conference in Soerabaya, Indonesia, in 2010, making most if not all of the LGBT organisations in Asia aware that their position in most societies was, and is, far from, lets put it mildly, ideal!

Opening ceremony 5th ILGA Conference, The Phoenix Rising

The shock of this forced cancellation was such that it took ILGA Asia, which has its own 8 member board, 3 years to recover, find renewed funding and a safe location to have their next conference (normally ILGA Asia has its conference every other year) because "Soerabaya" was not something which anyone wanted to experience again, not even close!

As LGBT community we are sadly used to be beated down, intimidated and al kinds of worse actions, by a mostly ignorant populations and/or knowingly by governements for whatever (sick?) reasons and/or distracting objectives.

And also individually we regularly, specially
living here in Asia, have to recuperate from physical or mental beatings.

Hence the wonderfull choice of naming the conference The Phoenix Rising, a mythical bird, close to my heart and a synonim for the nicknamegiven to me in my family, a long time ago by my stephmother... hence you find a small tattoo on my right upper arm of the Phoenix;-)

And how the Phoenix got airborn...

The 3 Phuketians, left to right: Vicky, NN, Aek and Tung

Attending these conferences is something one should preferably not do alone, except if one has to adress it, give lecture, workshop and/or moderate, etc... in other words if you just have to attend, don't do it alone!

In 3 days time more then 20 workshops were being held, as well as plenary sessions, the opening and closing ceremony, not to mention all that walking in and trough the corridors of the conference, were one truly meets his or her fellow participants, can exchange one-on-one experiences, make contacts which can and most will be maintained via such social media as Facebook and Twitter!

Conference anno 2013 and social media

I realised suddenly that the last time I attended such a conference, Facebook(FB) and Twitter, to mention the two most popular ones, didn't exsist at all. People still communicated via (mobile)phone, (e-mail)letters,  etc... and if you think that last conference was in the last century, nope, I attended these things regularly between 1977 (auuu)  untill 2004 (national and internationally, and yes, al political and partly medical, regarding hiv & aids).

Though, as you all know, I enjoy using FB, I wa snot prepared, and definitly not fast enough to follow the announcement with details, for blogging, FB, twitter etc.  When I realized what that announcement was all about the meeting was well on its way, hahahaha!

The smoking room of the conference.

I realised my learning curve was well on its way, in more directions  then anticipated BUT gratefull for it! Next such an event I will be better prepared!

To continue this sidestepping here: 

I also discovered how it is to attend such an event with my new visual handicap. How absolute troublesom it is to eat when a buffet is being laid-out, try to get your plate to your place without loosing part if not al of its contents on the way (so, location of your place is important), moving around in the corridors or lobby with a cup of coffee and your cane to so-called feel the surroundings nearby and warn people of your handicap, in a crowd were most had no idear of the meaning of the white stick with the two red cirkels round it, hahahaha... from left and right they walke dinto me because I simply could not see them so close and the first coffees went mostly there were we wouldn't like to see it go... so, though  I quitsmoking, the safest place to withdraw with my coffee was the smokingroom, which, surprise surprise with all these gays and lesbians, transgenders etc. was relative a place of quiet, Same time it turned out to be also a great place of meeting people and have a quiet chat with them ....... okay, and if I go on I make a further side step, and that is better not done in this context here;-) .

By the way, my 3 Phuketians, when around, were very attentive as soon as they noticed my predicaments with these matters!

Mental Health

The first workshop that appeared on the programm and intrigued me was the one about Mental Health.

I allways had the impression it was something easily(?) used in SE Asia to accuse and disqualify / condem, but hardly used for the positive, to help people back on their feet again if/when needed.

I was not far off.

The initiators and moderator aproach of the subject was from the Human Rights (HR) angle, rather a western aproach at that, if I might add, though in the end it all boils down to the same kind of outcome.

The other surprising observation was that all the initiators and moderator were non-Asian! Something which was also mentioned by themselves.

In most if not all Asian societies it is simply not done to talk about personal(?) issues and problems outside the family, even when certain issues can hardly be spoken about within the family, sexual orientation being definitly one of them!

This, ”can we call it a cultural taboe? ” , was also one of the reasons why no Asian initiators or moderator from Asia were found to speak on the conference. None of the attendants of this well attended workshop objected or commented on this sad observation!

But occasionally it (starts) to happen, because the one exception seems discussing issues with monks. And every now and then some of them link up with a psychologist if the religious angle is not getting anywhere. Likewise a psychologist told us they do the same, when they felt the religious approach was going to be more effective.

What surprised me the cooperation this suggested between the two, but then a psychologist in Asia still has few (proffesional) friends, it seems. But it also says something about monks realising that they can't profide answers to everything and that there is no shame, or whatever, to call in external help/angles to solve someones troubles.

What also surprised me a little bit, at least as far as I could notice, is that while the initiators and moderator where more or less challenging the audience, asking the audience for a respons in this matter, non really came forward, regardless the relative high turn-out for this workshop! Quite contrary to the active attitude I noticed during the whole conference, it became clear to me that initaitors and moderator were quite spot-on about the relative unchartered territory here and the (great?) reluctance but great curiosity by the attendents.

Well it was here that I made my first small contribution.

Workshop Mental Health 

Following the speakers, initaitors, I could not help thinking of Backstage's workshop about “Intercultural relationships between farang and Thais” during Phuket Gay Pride 2012. So I mentioned it to this ILGA workshop.

Telling that we, me/Backstage and Phuket Gay Homestay, came to organising this workshop due to our own experiences in our own long term relationships, and how we found in “Open Mind Projects” from Nong Khai, a most excellent and willing partner to give the workshop, also as an experiment to themselves.

Normally OpenMindProjects organises training for volunteers who come to work temporarily in Thailand, Cambodja, Laos, Burma and Nepal to deal with the cultural differences between them and where they are going to do their volunteer work.

This first workshop of its kind, not to mention it taking place during a Phuket Gay Pride, was more succesfull then we had anticipated. A surprising amount of couples actually turned up and actively took part. During this workshop it became clear that most if not all Thais were more or less gently forced, blackmailed or whatever, to turn up and attend by their farang (non-Thai/caucasians) partners

How it happened is still hard to tell, for me that is, but the two moderators from OpenMindProjects, from Sweden and Thailand, not only managed to get all participants to open up in this semi-public setting, at the end of the workshop it were the Thais who were asking when the next workshop was going to be, they clearly made it known they truly had enjoyed the workshop and would enjoy more of it.....

I suggested, and by the reaction not in vain, that maybe OpenMIndProjects had, maybe unknowingly, with their chosen method, found a way to get Thais to open up in a safe setting and that it might be benificiary for initiators/moderator/ILGA to maybe get in tough with them to see what might come out of it!

Want to have a look yourself what OpenMindProjects does, have a look at their website: www.openmindprojects.org and you'll notice its a more then reputabel organisation with worldwide recognition!

When I came back from the ILGA conference and was telling my hubby, he at first misunderstood me and enthousiastically asked if we were going to have another such workshop during the upcomming Gay Pride. Though he strongly objected and objects to any involvement of mine in last years and present (non-Thai) Pride organisation, it became clear he would though have applauded another such workshop!

Please forgive any typing errors or grammatical mistakes, it is not intended to be a (near) perfect presentable report;-) In other words after getting this far finally, I just prefer to hit the publication-button and get it over and done with for this first part, hope you as reader can sympathize with that ;-)

Part II will follow very soon and will cover impressions of the following workshops:

- Strategizing for sub-regional LGBT Advocacy, the case of ASEAN ...

- Experiences in disaster and disaster preparedness of Sexual Minority Communities

- LGBT in national education systems