Tales Of The Waria Documentary

Indonesia is the largest Muslim country population wise, and does have a trans community inside its borders called the waria..   A documentary has been produced by director Kathy Huang which follows three members of this community called  Tales Of The Waria.

The first video clip is of Kathy Huang describing her documentary and the second one is a trailer for it.  enjoy.

Upcoming Harisu Documentary In Korea

I remember when a young Korean transwoman named Harisu burst onto the scene in 2001 by doing a commercial for a  local cosmetic brand called Dodo. 




She not only turned heads because of her striking beauty, over the decade she would become a sought after model and K-pop star, trans rights advocate, eventually get married in 2007, and open a trans themed nightclub.   She would also become a role model for young transwomen in Korea.



Ten years after that groundbreaking debut, the SBS network is broadcasting a documentary entitled 'Harisu: Ten Years Of Her Dream'.  It will focus on what has been transpiring in Harisu's life since she became an iconic part of her homeland.

I'll just have to wait until somebody uploads it to YouTube to see it.

Thailand's Got Talent Trans Singer

If we're given a chance, we trans people can do anything we set our minds to do and excel at it.    Here's the latest example of at trans singer competing on Thailand's Got Talent.

The song starts at the 1:04 mark.

Nepal And India To Count Trans People In Their 2011 Censuses

It's an idea I started talking about in 2007 on this blog that needs to happen for American based transpeople in 2020, but Nepal and India are actually executing..

When Nepal and India both conduct their 2011 national censuses, trans people will be counted in both nations.

Nepal’s Central Bureau of Statistics director Bikash Bista said, “Earlier, we had only two categories, men and women. But in the upcoming census, we are including a ‘third gender’ category.” This move will allow those who do not fit into binary gender categories or who identify solely as a third gender to be counted. The new category should also ease the path to citizenship, to which transgender Nepalis are already entitled by law.

Next door in India, when they begin the herculean task of counting the 1 billion people that live in the country, the count will also include transpeople for the first time as a separate category.

“This is a leap forward for us. Till now we were unknown people… now, we will have some status in our own country,” said respected Indian based international trans activist Laxmi Narayan Tripathi. 

What is about to take place in Nepal and India and the additional legitimacy they gain in their respective nations by being counted in the their census is exactly is why I've been arguing for four years now we needed to have a trans category for the just completed 2010 United States census.

We need to get started now while they are doing the post mortem on the 2010 census in getting included in the 2020 one.   United States trans community, we can make this happen, we just need to do it.  

Frack the TS vs. TG catfight, let's just get some hard numbers about exactly how many of the 308,745,538 Americans living here are under the trans umbrella.

Let's get the trans identity option on the census now, get counted, and parse out who belongs to what group later. 

Islamic Defenders Front Hatin' Again

To paraphrase the late Houston consumer advocate Marvin Zindler, it's hell to be trans.    There are some places on the planet where it can be problematic, and one of them is Indonesia.

The fundamentalist haters in the Islamic Defenders Front have taken it upon themselves to 'defend Islam' by jacking with anything they perceive as 'gay'.

A regional ILGA conference in Surabaya was disrupted by IDF thugs back in April, and a GLBT film festival in Jakarta back in September.

They've been fracking with trans beauty pageants since 2005.

The pageant they recently bumrushed was one being held in conjunction with World AIDS Day.

This one had HIV/AIDS prevention 'ejumacation'  built into the pageant programming.   No thanks to the IDF that didn't happen.

It was sorely needed prevention education since the HIV/AIDS infection rates in Indonesia are spiking up.

But bigots never let facts get in the way of the desire to execute faith based hatred on a marginalized group they don't like.       

Miss Amazing Philippine Beauties 2010 Is....

Contestant number 22, Ms. Bello Anne Francisco!.    

The 1st Runner-Up was contestant number 2 Myfer Quimpo,  2nd Runner-Up was contestant number 19 Angela Jazmine Ragasa; 3rd Runner-Up was Jhana Tanya Roxas; 4th Runner up was contestant number 14 Hannah Mae Hernandez .

Congrats to Bello.and may she have a long and peaceful reign until she relinquishes the APB crown at the ninth annual event next year.   May she also have better luck at Miss International Queen 2011 than some of her predecessors.

 

Miss International Queen 2010 Is...

  

Miss Korea,  Mini Han!

1st Runner up was Ami Takeuchi of Japan

2nd Runner up was Stasha Sanchez of the USA. (Damn)

Stasha has been one of my fave pageant sistahs for years and I was hoping she'd not only bring that Miss International Queen title back to the USA, but in the process become the first African-American to win it.

The last African-American contestant to participate in the Miss International Queen pageant was my homegirl Domanique Shappelle in 2006  

The Japanese girls almost pulled off the back to back wins.  2009 queen Ai Haruna won it last year 

Once the pics get posted on the Net from the pageant I'll post them here.