As the year 2009 comes to a close, it does so having been a monumental year for China's LGBT community. Beijing and numerous cities across China experienced the successful completion of 12 anniversaries and public events that expose LGBT culture and related issues like never before. 

China's LGBT community, which is an acronym that refers to lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgender people, has adapted the terms tongzhi to refer to gays, lala for lesbians, ku'er for queer - an umbrella term for those who do not identify as heterosexual with regard to sexuality, sexual anatomy or gender identity.

The community is young. Most are in their 20s and 30s, are educated, working professionals with experience abroad who are now highly active and public organizers, authors, editors, designers, film directors, curators, activists and artists.

One catalyst was the Olympic Games in 2008, a landmark event that many in the LGBT community have interpreted as a "coming out" event. LGBT websites have allowed for communities to build, to advertise events, and to allow contact and information to be exchanged between LGBT members from big cities and small towns in China with those from around the world.

As one of the organizers of China's first gay pride events and editor for shanghaiist.com, Kenneth Tan, puts it: "Gay people, young and old, are now coming out en masse. These people are all what I call 'first generation queers'."

 

Policies, too, have been slowly changing. At a national level, 1997 saw the removal of sodomy from the country's list of crimes; homosexuality was removed from the list of mental disorders in 2001; and since 2003 prominent sexologist and activist, Li Yinhe, has been proposing same-sex marriage legislation at the annual Two Sessions.

In China, where LGBT-themed films are prohibited and gay-themed exhibitions, novels and magazines are taboo, the success of many of these events have been years in the making. Organizers have gotten creative: they arrange other activities; they hold their film festivals and art exhibitions just outside major cities; they keep publicity to a minimum.

So with all this happening, what does the future hold for China's LGBT community? Li Yinhe has revealed plans to propose another same-sex marriage bill in 2010. And in a nation without ratings, perhaps introducing them to TV shows and films, will help lift the ban on gay and lesbian characters on screen. Perhaps China will witness the coming-out of its first celebrity.

Yet among all involved to promote awareness and to end discrimination, there seems to be a consensus: they have come a long way, but there is still a long way to go.

Qin Zhongwei, Wang Chao and Yang Wanli contributed to the story.

Organizers within the LGBT community wanted media attention for their cause, and that is exactly what they got, starting 2009 off with one gay and one lesbian couple dressed in wedding attire posing for photos among the crowd at Qianmen Pedestrian Street, located south of Tian'anmen Square.

 

Valentine's Day events for LGBT groups have become part of an annual campaign since 2007.

The day is significant for couples as it is closer to March when the annual National People's Congress Standing Committee meeting is held where prominent sexologist and activist Li Yinhe proposed her landmark same-sex marriage bill the year before. (Li has proposed a bill three times: 2003, 2005, and 2006).

"We wanted to spark public debate and awareness," said Jiang Hui of Aibai, who came up with the idea. "It gives people a chance to visualize it. So it's encouragement for LGBT people because they can stand out to express themselves."

The couples who participated were not, in fact, real couples, although they all identify as gay and lesbian.

Xu Bin, who helped organize the first Lala Camp held in Zhuhai in 2007, explained that the volunteers were in relationships with partners that were reluctant to participate, but "were out and willing to promote this cause."

May 17: Rainbow In Motion Bike Ride, Beijing

Cycling through seven colleges in Beijing, students and supporters wore T-shirts and logos with that said "Love Knows No Boundaries." At each campus was an activity to raise awareness either through petitions or the distribution of education materials.

Rainbow in Motion, organized by Aibai and Tongyu, marked the first public campaign in China on the International Day Against Homophobia.

Finding universities to host was not easy, however. "Some [universities] supported it and some didn't give their approval for it to happen, but students did it anyway," Jiang said. "The normal universities are easier, and more willing to allow for events like this on their campuses. I think it is because they are less high-profile," he acknowledged. "Schools like Beida and Tsinghua chose not to participate."

 

The Chinese mainland's very first gay pride event was held in Shanghai as a series of events held in private venues: panel discussions, art shows, literary evenings, parties, wine tasting events, film screenings, and sports events.

 

According to Pride organizer, Kenneth Tan, one of Shanghai LGBT's founders, Hannah Miller came up with the idea just before heading back to the US to do her masters. "She floated the idea to us, everyone said yes, and the rest is history."

An estimated 3,000 people attended the six-day festival with people flying in from all over China.

"I think people went away refreshed with a vision of what things could be like in the future," said Tan.

June 14-21: Difference Gender Art Exhibition, Beijing

Despite the fact local authorities arrived the day prior and removed several pieces from the exhibition that were considered "pornographic", the first public queer art exhibition in China survived to embrace 500 visitors on its opening day.

Past attempts at having an LGBT-themed art exhibition met with closure before even being allowed to open.

"This was the first one that really worked," Yang Ziguang, who curated the exhibition, told METRO.

"We wanted to raise the consciousness of individuals and communicate with the public," said Sam, founder and editor of Les+ Magazine,one of the exhibition's sponsors.

One of the artists, Zheng Bo, copied and modified some of his pieces on display at the Guangdong Museum of Contemporary Art in Guangzhou. After two years of preparation and a team of more than 50 people, including 14 participating artists, the exhibition was deemed an overwhelming success, attracting visitors both gay and straight.

June 17: Fourth Beijing International Queer Film Festival

Songzhuang Art Village played host to another first for the Chinese LGBT community - a film festival that did not get shut down. But the fourth time, it turned out, was the charm.

For fellow organizer, Cui Zi'en, who is a well-known film director, scholar and LGBT activist, told METRO that like the Difference Gender Art Exhibition, the location in Songzhuang had a lot to do with the festival's success, as did their decision to not publicize it in advance.

Half of the LGBT-themed films shown were Chinese and the other half were from abroad. The Fourth Beijing International Queer Film Festival included a new element, called "Queer From Diverse Cultures," which invited a queer film festival from another country to curate one program of films. Another highlight was the successful gathering of queer films and filmmakers from the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore and three panel discussions.

"That's the function of our festival and our goal: to make an open and free platform for people of different points of view and positions to express and share."

June 28: PFLAG China's 2nd anniversary, Guangzhou

Wu Youjian, founder of PFLAG China, is the mother of the first gay man to come out on Chinese television in 2004. After appearing on a television show the following year in support of her son, Zheng Yuantao told METRO that it was then she really started paying attention to issues involving China's LGBT community.

"I set up PFLAG because I wanted to establish a social network to help them, especially their parents, and to increase the understanding and communication between gays and their parents and relatives," Wu explained.

An official chapter of the original US organization PFLAG, which is an acronym for "Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays", PFLAG China boasts 30 active parents and 120 volunteers, said Wu. They also hold bi-annual meetings, called "Talk Frankly Gay Parents" for parents of gays and lesbians all over China. The next one will take place in January 2010.

July 27-Aug 2: The World Outgames, Copenhagen

2009 marked the first time a Chinese delegation attended the World Outgames held in Copenhagen. Tongyu founder and director, Xu Bin, who attended the first Outgames conference in Montreal in 2006, said she immediately felt the need to form a Chinese delegation for the next one.

Fan Popo, an LGBT activist who is very involved in the community and an avid marathoner, told METRO: "I was out and willing to accept the media attention that would be part of going to the Outgames, I decided to compete in the marathon competition."

With financial support local organization the Outgames committee in Denmark , Fan was able to attend the Outgames. It was a life-changing experience for him.

"The environment in Denmark is really wonderful," he said. "I found that the people there were really tolerant of LGBT people. They treated them like ordinary people."

While Fan did not bring home a medal, the Chinese delegation succeeded in coming home with a Gold Medal in beach volleyball and a Bronze in ping pong.

August: Courage by Xiao Jie

The gay-themed novel, Courage, was published in the Chinese mainland by China Northern Publishing House.

"In terms of the content, I thought it was no problem to get it published," said Zhang Jingqiu, who owns the publishing house. "It depends, sometimes certain editors get nervous."

For a publishing house, often they were afraid of creating problems for themselves, said Xiao Jie (a sobriquet) of his most recent novel, Courage.

"There's not a government regulation that says no, but there's not much of a precedent for it."

Cui Zi'en, director and activist and organizer of the Beijing Queer Film festivals, however, was the first to set the precedent in terms of gay-themed literature on the Chinese mainland. After writing a novel in 1997, the author found it very difficult to find someone willing to publish it.

"I almost tried every publishing house in the Chinese mainland, but it never worked out," he said.

"At last, it was published in Hong Kong seven or eight years after it was written."

"There are gay novels published in China, but they're written by foreigners and imported," Xiao Jie said.

The August 2009 issue of iLook Magazine marked the first time gay-related issues were made the main theme of a mainstream Chinese magazine.

 

Fashion designer, Xander Zhou, was invited by iLook's managing editor, Hong Huang, to be a guest editor because the issue would appear exactly one year after China hosted the Olympic Games, he said in an interview.

"I thought this would be an interesting theme to explore visually...hence the Gay China issue."

"I didn't really set out to tell readers everything about gays in China - I think a lot is written about that already. I didn't intend to 'discuss the social issue of homosexuality'," he said. "I just wanted to explore the connection between the gay world and the fashion world."

The issue devoted 233 pages to the theme and the first 50,000 copies were sold out within a matter of days. "So the issue got a reprint," Zhou told METRO.

October-November : China Queer Film Talk Tour

Taking Chinese LGBT-themed films on tour to 16 different cities, China Queer Film Talk welcomed its second year.

The 2009 tour was organized by Xiao Gang, founder and one host of "Queer Comrades", an online talk show that has run webisodes each month for the last three years related to LGBT topics in China.

The idea behind the tour, as with the Beijing queer film festivals, is that LGBT-themes films are not allowed in the Chinese mainland.

"Some people don't really have a chance to see Chinese queer films," Xiao Gang said in an interview at the opening China Queer Film Talk screening.

The tour stopped in major cities, like Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Chengdu, Shanghai and Suzhou, offering many the opportunity to view films about queer culture in China in an open and safe environment.

Nov 20-22: 3rd Annual Lala Camp, Guilin, Guanxi

For Xu Bin, who helped organize the first Lala Camp held in Zhuhai in 2007, the camp was an effort to "get the next generation of young lesbian activists to share the same experience and to make connections for joint projects -- to do something to change Chinese community."

The first camp was so successful that the next year had the main camp in Shanghai, with four mini-camps in Beijing, Chengdu, Kunming and Anshan. It culminated in the establishment of the Chinese Lala Alliance, which organized this year's Lala Camp in Guilin.

The camp, which spanned two and half days of intensive training and lectures, gathered over 50 lesbian, bisexual and transgender youth organizers across the Chinese mainland, as well as Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the US. According to Xu, funding for the camps receives most of its funding from overseas Chinese women's foundations.

"We have three major overseas women's foundations: two in the US and one in Europe," she explained. "They have a history of supporting lesbian activities, and it looks like they are happy to support a fourth."

Dec 19: Gay bar opening sponsored by the government, Dali, Yunnan

For the first time, the government of the city of Dali, in Yunnan province, helped provide funding for a gay bar.

Scheduled to open on Dec 1, World AIDS day, Zhang Jianbo and local officials decided to postpone it until Dec 19 due to privacy concerns for volunteers and customers involved.

Zhang is the founder of the Dali HIV/AIDS Prevention and Health Center.

The bar received partial funding from the Dali health bureau and two local NGOs.

Its main function is to reach out to gay men, who are among the most at risk for HIV/AIDS.