Older gay men stories
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This was after homosexuality was decriminalised in Hong Kong.
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Yet he never told his family about the men he met in public toilets or movie theatres when he became a widower. Like many old timers, he told his children about his life in Hong Kong during the Japanese occupation and how, without an education, he was apprenticed to an optician until he learned the trade well enough to open his own optometry shop.
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From the outside, his family appeared a happy one. He married in his twenties, as was expected in traditional Hong Kong society, and he and his wife had five kids. Old Chan was the most senior of the interviewees and lived closeted his whole life until he passed away in 2013. In other words, they could find partners just about anywhere. They mostly came from working-class backgrounds and found male romantic partners in public bath houses, cinemas, and parks, as well as in the street or riding ferries. The men Kong interviewed were 60 or older and all had lived in Hong Kong for at least 30 years. Kong, Oral Histories of Older Gay Men in Hong Kong.
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This was long before the queer reappropriation of the term tongzhi. They did not know the word “homosexuality”, or had not heard the traditional Chinese euphemisms yutao, duanxiu, and Lord Long Yang.
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Most interviewees had no idea how to name their same-sex desires when they were young. What’s more, most of these men came of age decades before gay spaces like bars and clubs were allowed to operate in the open after homosexuality was decriminalised in 1991. They all tell of a time and generation that wasn’t accepting of homosexuality. But the majority are still unable to come out as gay. Oral Histories of Older Gay Men in Hong Kong: Unspoken but Unforgotten has been published in Chinese and in English and tells the stories of 13 older gay men in Hong Kong, some of whom have been out for years. Suk Suk is based on a groundbreaking study and book by Professor Travis S. In their twilight years, they reflect back on their accomplishments as heads of their families, yet there’s something desperately missing from their lives and they wonder if they could ever build a life together. In 2019, director Ray Yeung captivated films festivals around the world with Suk Suk, his film about a pair of older gay men in Hong Kong who have lived as straight their whole lives.