Pride on the Down-Low: Swaziland and Queerness

When I came out to my parents as bisexual, we were in South Africa. South Africa was the third country in the world to legalize equal marriage. When I began to embrace my identity as a queer woman and became involved with the community, it was in my city of Vancouver. Canada's prime minister frequently comes to our annual Pride march. June is a month of rainbows and flamboyant celebrations and affirmations of #loveislove written on everything from yoga mats to lattes. I'm now spending my first June, my first Pride in eSwatini.

At one of the talks we ran during Pride Week, a guest speaker explained a custom. If you are found out to be a homosexual, she told us, you would be sent away from your community, and told to cross five rivers before you could stop. eSwatini is a very small country. If you can cross the required number of rivers and find a community, you would then have to explain why you had to leave your last home. If they find out that you are a homosexual, they won't let you stay. What then? Where do you go?

Last year, a group of four students at Waterford held the school's first Pride Week, coinciding with eSwatini's first ever Pride march in Mbabane. This year, they picked four IB1s to be the new heads of Pride Week, including me. It has been challenging. Back home, Pride has become so comfortingly commercialized that there is little need for explanations on why transgender people and drag queens are completely different things. Although much of the original grassroots origins of Pride in the global north has been subsumed by a commercial celebration, there is some reassurance in that. My identity has become so much the norm that it can be sold at Forever 21. With this commodification, has come acceptance, or at least a lack of hate.

Here, we've watched students spit on our rainbow chalk drawings, wipe away whiteboard announcements for workshops. In the hostel for the form fives, our posters with the Pride week schedule were torn down four times. Teachers complained that we've forced Pride down the throats of the school's conservative populace. We have tried to balance education with respect for culture and custom, but claiming conservative mores can only explain away so much intolerance. For the IB students, the teachers are not as blatantly homophobic, but my friend's English teacher still complained about our Pride Week assembly, and how boys holding hands made him uncomfortable. Last year, the school outed a pair of girls to their parents. They sent the parents an email to ask if they were aware that their daughter was dating a girl. In the lower forms hostels, one of the teachers who heads the hostel removes any posters mentioning the LGBTQ+ community.

We've held a rainbow dress competition, last night I helped run a workshop on how to support a queer friend, and tonight we had the Rainbow Lounge, a low-key evening of performances, art, and a drag race. It's been an enormous amount of fun, and a privilege to work with my fellow heads of pride from Mozambique, the Maldives, Argentina, South Africa, and Israel. Any difference we may be making is small. Many of the lower forms feel unable to come to events due to bullying. Students in IB still display intolerance and claim free speech. It is hurtful. It is putting oneself on display and waiting for the cruel words to hit. It is somewhat frightening. I've been working to bring in guest speakers to do a queer friendly sex-ed talk, however same sex sexual relations are illegal.

But it is incredible inspiring. Tonight at the Rainbow Lounge, students, (and one incredible teacher) performed original songs, read poetry, and danced. Around the room, people hugged, held hands, took pictures in front of the rainbow flags. We had a poster asking people to write what pride meant to them. 'Acceptance,' 'loving myself,' 'hope.' We are the product of over 60 countries, and when I look at us, all I feel is pride.

Me after the Rainbow Lounge tonight, my room in a state of chaos after doing makeup and drag for five or six people. Glitter is everywhere. Somehow there is eyeliner on my wall. 

I'm not including more pictures in this post due to privacy reasons for the individuals in them, and also because we're keen to keep Pride Week on the down low for safety reasons.