Yesterday was my first big LGBTQ related event. Although I am a huge supporter of the community, I have never had the opportunity to join one before (maybe partially due to my country culture), and this first experience was both exceptional and unforgettable for me.

It was exceptional not only because everything happening there was new to me but also because the overall atmosphere was welcoming and everyone there was open minded and accepting. It was a great surprise to me to see a community that filled with love and creativity, considering where I came from, the place where most of us had to hide our uniqueness.

To be honest, I have never seen such pure honest and genuine expressions of oneself before.

This event was created to influence the mindset of the people toward the definition of homosexuality, which is not based on nothing but love; and it definitively to a certain degree has done just that.

And if you don’t know already, one of my short films (Mirror) will be shown there (I am so honored) on the Saturday time slot. I hope people will like it though; and for a small portion, I hope to be apart of the reasons that people might somehow in the future look at a gay man or women in Asia and see nothing but a mere authentic human beings like everyone else.

What happened in brief:

The event started at around 7:00pm. I arrived that at about 7:10pm because I need to do some stuff at home and although the place is near to my house, the traffic was crazy.

So, I got there to see quite a lot of people sitting, waiting for the event to start.

I walked in to find my friends, Honey and Arkar, and then to my surprise, there was another Cambodia citizen there! (What?!)

I was introduced to him and I found out that he had seen another short film of mine called Mana at the Chaktomuk Short Film Festival in Cambodia last year! (That was insane!).

We had fun but he had to leave early so, I was left alone with my awesome friend Tiffany.

There were speeches and dances and performances and of course laughter.

Last night, they also showed 3 documentaries (Channel G, Dear Mom, and Soul mates) by the Myanmar Rainbow Reel (they were awesome!!!) and another one (This Kind of Love) by Mr. Aung Myo Min, who had a sad but incredible life in Thailand and currently, is one of the most famous LGBTQ activists in Myanmar.

The event ended with an incredible dance performance and a lot of drinks.

Continue to Day 2 !!! Thanks for reading 🙂