My First Gay Pride: A Plato’s Cave Experience

In The Bakla and The Gay: While I was being a bakla, she was being gay,  I recounted the conversation I had many years ago while still living in the Philippines with a Filipino-American named Leslie. Leslie lives and grew up in the US and was spending her summer vacation in the Philippines that year. Although we barely knew each other,   we clicked so much and instantly became good friends. We became so close that I opened up to her about my being love sick to a good looking man named Jordan.

As I opened up to her, I was really taken aback when she asked whether Jordan was gay like myself or not and how genuinely disappointed she was to learn from me that Jordan is in fact straight. Little did I know back then, that unlike in the Philippines, gays have relationship with gays in the US where she grew up. I put my confusion aside; did not bother to ask for further clarification and just continued with our conversation. Leslie’s response begun to make sense to me after few months when a friend of mine introduced me to the gay pride in Malate, Manila.