City Pride: Singapore

I haven’t done a “City Pride” for a long time. In fact, I think the last one I did was for Paris to celebrate the Gay Games in 2018. So, last year I decided it was time to highlight another city and its lgbt+ heritage. The question was, which city? Then I noticed I had a lot of readers in Singapore, and I realised that I knew hardly anything about its lgbt+ community, except for Pink Dot. So, after months of looking for appropriate points in Singapore’s queer history and culture I have selected the following. The main task was to find places that are grouped together which are as diverse as the community itself.

If you’re from Singapore I doubt any of these will be unknown to you, and I hope I have done my research correctly.

As before, the map is not intended to be used as the means for you to get from one location to another. It is intended purely as a rough guide to where the locations are situated. Many roads and streets are omitted, but I hope there is enough information for you to find them on proper maps.

1) Crocodile Rock, Scotts Road - The oldest and longest-running lesbian bar in Singapore, operating between 1992 and 2007. Alternatively known as Croc Rock.

2) KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital, Bukit Timah Road - More Singaporians have been born here than in any other hospital in Singapore, so naturally this would include a lot of lgbt+ people. However, the reason I put it on this list is because it was also the hospital which performed the first male-to-female sex-assignment surgery in the country in 1971.

3) Pelangi Pride Centre, Rowell Road - This is the original location of Singapore’s first lgbt+ centre. It was founded in 2003 by the city’s Action for AIDS (AfA) charity in the offices above their headquarters. Both the Pelangi Pride Centre and Action for AIDS have moved to other premises (see number 4).

4) Action for AIDS (AfA), Kelantan Lane - The charity’s present location. AfA was founded in 1988 by dermatologist Dr. Roy Chan (b.1955) who is still it’s President. Dr. Chan competed for Singapore in swimming at the 1972 Olympics.

5) The Substation, Armenian Street - The first independent contemporary arts centre in Singapore, founded in 1990 on the site of a former power station. It has organised many exhibitions of lgbt+ artists and interests. It was the venue of the monthly forum of People Like Us (PLU), 1993-4, an lgbt+ lobby group formed in 1993.

6) Suntec Singapore International Conference and Exhibition Centre - Venue of Singapore’s first National AIDS Conference on 12 December 1998. At this conference Paddy Chew became the first person in Singapore to come out publicly as having HIV. He died the following year. His life was the basis for the play “Completely With/Out Character” by Haresh Sharma. More recently, it was the venue for the wrestling competition at the very first Youth Olympic Games in 2010 (see number 8). Here, the oldest of the 9 lgbt+ athletes, 17-year-old Jenna Burkert, competed for the USA.

7) Rascals, Pan Pacific Hotel - Rascals was a club that organised a gay night at the Pan Pacific Hotel every Sunday. On 30 May 1993, Singapore police raided the club and interrogated its customers. It is regarded as Singapore’s “Stonewall”, an event which had a significant effect on the lgbt community and its future.

8) The Float, Marina Bay - With my specialist interest in the Olympics it comes as no surprise that I mention it several times. The very first Youth Olympic Games were held in Singapore in 2010. The opening ceremony was held at The Float, and is the first Olympic opening ceremony to be held on water, despite what Paris 2024 thinks. The Singapore Youth Olympics were also significant for currently having the most known lgbt+ athletes, 9, though none of them were publicly out at the time. Among them was British diver Tom Daley, the only one of the 9 who had competed in a previous Olympics (Beijing 2008, aged 14). If Tom makes it to Paris 2024 without injury, he will equal US equestrian rider Robert Dover’s record of competing at 6 Olympics. Only one lgbt+ Youth Olympian won a medal in Singapore 2010, a gold for Austrian sailor Lara Vadlau. She, like Tom Daley, has qualified for Paris 2024.

 9) Pink Dot, Speaker’s Corner, Hong Lim Park - Location of the annual Pink Dot Pride event. The first was held here on 16 May 2009, when it attracted the largest attendance for any gathering at Speaker’s Corner up to that date. The only years it was not held here were during the covid pandemic in 2020 and 2021 when they were held online. Pink Dot events have been held in other cities around the world, all following the same signature format of attendees wearing pink.

10) Boat Quay - Before this area was redeveloped in the 1990s, the streets around Boat Quay were popular cruising grounds for gay men.

Game of Gay Thrones 8: Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, Byzantium, Murcia, Dai Viet and Anhalt

To mark last Saturday’s historic coronation of King Charles III here is another batch of lgbt+ people who were prevented from becoming sovereign, or who unlawfully declared themselves to be one.

We’ll start with a man who was born into the British royal family but was deprived of his titles by the king.

Prince Hubertus von Saxe-Coburg-Gotha (1909-1943) – heir apparent of the duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.

In 1826 the German duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha was created. The title of duke eventually passed to the children of Prince Albert von Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the husband of Queen Victoria of the UK. By 1917 the Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha was Victoria and Albert’s grandson, Prince Charles, Duke of Albany.

During World War I Charles (I suppose I should use his German name Karl) fought for Germany against Britain. This prompted the UK to pass the Titles Deprivations Act 1917. This stripped British royals who were fighting for Germany of all their British titles, and the loyal British royals dropped their German titles. This is when the UK Royals adopted the family name Windsor and the Princes of Battenburg became the Mountbattens.

After the war the German Weimar Republic abolished all royal titles, though many remained in use unofficially, as they are still today. The ex-reigning royals became the titular heads of their dynasties. Karl’s eldest son renounced his rights to succeed as head of the Saxe-Coburg-Gotha dynasty in 1932. The heir became Karl’s second son, Prince Hubertus.

Like his father Prince Hubertus became a high-ranking Nazi officer, but unlike his father Hubertus was actually anti-Hitler. Surprisingly, there are reports that Hitler would have appointed Prince Hubertus governor of the UK after a successful invasion, making him third in rank in the entire Nazi party. It has become apparent through research carried out in the last decade that Prince Hubertus was a closeted gay man. He never married, had no known relationships, or an interest in getting married.

During World War II Hubertus was a Luftwaffe pilot. He was killed when his plane was shot down by the Soviet Air Force in 1943. His father outlived him and died in 1954 and Hubertus’s nephew became head of the Saxe-Coburg and Gotha family.

Staurakios (d.800) – attempted to become Emperor of Byzantium

Staurakios was one of the many eunuchs who held high positions at the imperial Byzantine court. However, Byzantine law forbad eunuchs from occupying the throne. This didn’t stop Staurakios from trying.

Staurakios was the chief minister and most powerful man in the empire during the reign of Empress Irene, who favoured giving top positions to eunuchs. This was mainly because she distrusted the officials who had been appointed by her predecessor, her late husband Emperor Leo IV. This also meant that those officials distrusted the eunuchs, Staurakios in particular.

Staurakios’s career rose and fell on a regular basis. Irene appointed him her foreign minister (in 781); he was captured by Sultan Harun-al Rashid (782); after his release he gained Byzantine control over Slavic Greece (784); was sacked, flogged, and exiled by Irene’s son Co-Emperor Constantine (790); and then recalled back to Byzantium and reinstated (791).

When Constantine died Staurakios found that he had a rival. He and Aetius, another eunuch appointed to a high position by Empress Irene, began a power struggle to ensure control of the empire after Irene’s death. Aetius accused Staurakios of trying to usurp the throne. Although Irene believed this, all Staurakios got was just a metaphorical slap on the wrist and told not to do it again.

But it does appear that Staurakios was indeed plotting to become emperor when Irene died. In 800 Irene decided to limit his authority over the army, which he was bribing, to prevent him from organising a military campaign against Aetius. However, Staurakios was becoming ill at around this time. His advisers and doctors assured him he would recover and become emperor. So he continued his campaign against Aetius. He should have ignored his advisers and rested. He died a few weeks later.

Muhammad ibn Ammar (1031-1086) – self-proclaimed Emir of Murcia, Spain.

This poet was the lover of Abbad III al Mu’tamid (1040-1095), the Emir and Caliph of Seville, who was also a poet. The two met when they were teenagers and a close bond developed quickly though their love of poetry and each other. However, al-Mu’tamid’s father, Emir Abbad II, was suspicious of ibn Ammar’s influence and banished him. Needless to say, when Abbad II died and al-Mu’tamid succeeded as Abbad III, ibn Ammar was recalled, and he was appointed Vizier.

Ibn Ammar led the conquest of the neighbouring kingdom of Murcia, deposing its emir in 1078. He told the Murcian people that they deserved a better emir, and he decided that this better emir was himself. This displeased Abbad III, who had not given him permission to declare himself emir. The two poets exchanged sarcastic poems, not meant to be malicious, but they both took them personally and their friendship deteriorated. Not only that, but ibn Ammar’s reign as self-appointed emir also deteriorated and eventually he was deposed.

Returning to Seville as a prisoner ibn Ammar misjudged Abbad’s attempts at a reconciliation and, reluctantly, Abbad ordered his execution. Nonetheless, Abbad gave ibn Ammar a sumptuous funeral.

Prince Lê Tuân (1482-1512) – heir presumptive of Dai Viet.

Dai Viet was a medieval kingdom in what is now northern Vietnam. Prince Lê Tuân was the eldest son of King Lê Hien Tong. In 1499 the king was persuaded by his high ranking courtiers to name his successor to ensure the stability of the kingdom.

The king thought Prince Lê Tuân, was unsuitable. He was too hot-heated and often dressed as a woman, so he chose his youngest son as his successor instead. An even bigger reason to overlook Prince Lê Tuân than his cross-dressing was because he had plotted to drug his own mother.

Both of Lê Tuân’s younger brothers became kings of Dai Viet in succession. The first was very popular, but the second was a murderous maniac, disposing of many other royal princes. Lê Tuân thought it best to hide away to avoid the same fate as them.

Lê Tuân’s penchant for wearing women’s clothing didn’t hinder his marriage, and he has many living descendants, all, technically, the senior bloodline heirs of the Lê dynasty of Dai Viet. When Lê Tuân died he was declared as god by the people of the Biansia commune of Dai Viet, which is now part of China.

Prince Aribert von Anhalt (1864-1933) – heir apparent to the Duchy of Anhalt

I briefly wrote about Prince Aribert’s involvement in the first modern Olympic Games in 1896 (spoiler alert – next month I’ll be writing about another European gay prince who was even more heavily involved).

The duchy of Anhalt was a small sovereign German state within the German Empire, just as the above-mentioned duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. Prince Aribert was the last heir apparent before the Weimar Republic abolished all royal titles.

Actually Anhalt was not abolished by the Weimar Republic with the others. In 1918, the final days of the German Empire, Anhalt saw the year of three sovereigns. Aribert’s eldest brother, the reigning Duke of Anhalt, died childless in April 1918. Aribert’s next oldest brother, Prince Eduard, succeeded but died in September 1918. Eduard’s 17-year-old son Prince Joachim-Ernst then became duke. Prince Aribert was appointed regent for his nephew until Joachim-Ernst became 21. Until a time when Joachim-Ernst married and had children, Prince Aribert was heir to the title.

The day after the Armistice of 11th November 1918 was signed, which ended World War I, Prince Aribert announced the abdication of his nephew and the self-abolition of the duchy of Anhalt. As with Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, Prince Joachim-Ernst lost his royal title but became the head of the dynasty. Prince Aribert lost his place as heir when Prince Joachim-Ernst married and had children.

Extraordinary Life: The Japanese da Vinci - Part 2

After a really horrible first quarter of the year in which I have been battling illness, I really must apologise and catch up on my planned schedule. Last summer I wrote about the samurai who has been called the Japanese Leonardo da Vinci, Hiraga Gennai (1728-1870). The parallels between them aren’t exact but the sheer scope of Hiraga’s activity is more than enough to justify the comparison.

In that first article we left Hiraga relinquishing his feudal duties and abandoning any responsibilities to any feudal lord. He had the independence to pursue his own interests. A chronological survey of his life would see us jumping from one discipline to another. Individual surveys of each will reveal a better picture of Hiraga’s genius.

Let’s begin with the main focus of Part 1, which was Hiraga’s use of marketing. Product promotion isn’t something that was created in recent decades. The spread of the printing press across the globe from the 14th century helped to spread advertising and promotion more widely than any previous method. In Japan the development of printing during the first part of the Edo Period (1603-1868) saw a big increase in marketing, especially after paper prices began to drop.

The three main methods of advertising were product sponsorship of events, distribution of printed leaflets, and promotion of products during seasonal festivals. In fact, this is very much what we still see today. Hiraga used all of these methods. The third method was highlighted in Part 1 with his suggestion of promoting eels during the Midsummer Day of the Ox. This influenced others to sell their products and services in similar ways.

Among the other products Hiraga had a major hand in promoting was tooth powder, but he was also instrumental in the development of regional expositions of local products. He arranged several expositions from 1757, sending out invitations to potential exhibitors, writing and printing catalogues and promotional material and publicising them across a wide area. These expos increased national awareness in natural sciences such as pharmacology, agriculture and mining.

Hiraga’s interest in mining led to the setting up of several mining projects. Even though these eventually failed they did lead to the creation of the Arakawa River which greatly helped in the shipping of coal. One alarming mining project was finding a way to turn asbestos deposits into fire-resistant cloth.

Most of Hiraga’s accomplishments were influenced by his contact with Dutch merchants. The Dutch and Chinese were the only foreign merchants allowed into Japan and from them Hiraga learnt of the arts and sciences not known in Japan. Hiraga’s insatiable quest for knowledge drew him to the Dutch like a magnet. This made him a pioneer in Dutch studies in Japan, which is known as Rangaku.

Everything Hiraga learnt about European advances in science and technology came through observation and experimentation rather than formal tutoring. One of the devices he came across during his contact with Dutch merchants was a broken static electric generator. By disassembling it and working out how each part worked Hiraga managed to get the generator working again. It took him several years and the result caused a sensation. He gave public demonstrations of it working and gave electrotherapy to patients. Copies were made and other people began to use them in market places.

Another result of Hiraga’s contact with the Dutch was influenced by his knowledge of mineralogy and chemistry. As I mentioned above he developed mining techniques and he located a particularly good source of clay for producing high quality pottery. He persuaded the government to help him set up kilns and workshops, aimed at reducing the reliance on obtaining pottery from China or Holland. With influences from Dutch pottery Hiraga developed a new style that combined both Dutch and Japanese elements. This style became very popular and is now named after him – Gennai ware.

Hiraga’s knowledge of geology also led him to investigate the use of minerals in the production of paints and dyes. You’ll not be surprised to learn that Hiraga was an accomplished painter. Unfortunately, very little of his work survives, and there’s only one of his oil paintings known to exist today.

If you’ve read Part 1 of this Extraordinary Life you’ll probably be intrigued by a particular comment I made and are eager to know more. It was about Hiraga writing a book about farting whose title translates into English as “The Theory of Farting”. The title makes it sound like the book is a serious study of the subject, but is actually a satirical novel (Hiraga loved writing satire, which was a popular genre in his lifetime). The “Theory” is more of a discussion than a novel, not unlike ancient Greek philosophical works. The author describes his encounter with a street performer who could fart tunes and animal noises. A fellow spectator is appalled at the performance but the author goes into a speech on how farting is superior to any other art form. The performer is self taught, not a product of a school where he was taught to copy previous artists using established instruments and techniques. Hiraga is taking a dig at the artistic establishment, even though he was part of it himself. It reminds me of a performer called Methane Man who had a similar farting act and appeared on “Britain’s Got Talent”.

Hiraga was not just a satirist. He could turn his hand to other literary forms. His pioneering use of marketing was utilised in the catalogues he wrote for his many trade expositions; he write scientific books; and he write poetry. Hiraga’s homosexuality played a role in other works, such as a guide book on male prostitutes and passages on gay sex in his novels. One of his novels I am really interested to read is “Furyu shidoken”, Hiraga’s version of “Gulliver’s Travel”. The stories are not exact in content because it’s unlikely that Hiraga had actually seen a copy of “Gulliver’s Travels”. He may have heard snippets about the novel from his Dutch contacts and used these as inspiration for his own novel.

With the extraordinary variety of disciplines Hiraga Gennai took up it is highly appropriate to compare him with Leonado da Vinci. However, unlike da Vinci, Hiraga’s life ended on a down note. Several accounts of his final year vary in the detail but agree on the final outcome. In 1779 Hiraga was arrested for murder (of a carpenter or one of his disciples). Hiraga was imprisoned and died in jail at the end of the year.

Many scholarly works on Hiraga Gennai repeat the word “extraordinary” when describing his works, deeds and legacy. Like so much of east Asian history, comparatively very little is known in the west. While Hiraga may be unknown to the majority outside Japan in his native country, even in modern anime, his name is well known and familiar.

Extraordinary Life: The Japanese Da Vinci - Part 1

Today the Japanese are celebrating something other than the Olympics. Today is the Midsummer Day of the Ox. On this day the Japanese celebrate the season by eating eels. I bet you thought that as it was the Day of the Ox that they’d be eating beef, but you’d be wrong. But there’s a simple explanation as to why eels are eaten, and legend says that that it’s all due to a gay inventor, engineer, writer, artist, ceramicist, pharmacist event organiser, and marketing executive called Hiraga Gennai (1728-1780). It’s no surprise that some historians have labelled him the Japanese Leonardo da Vinci.

Hiraga Gennai’s life was so extraordinary, in some ways ahead of his time, that it needs two separate articles. Perhaps the most extraordinary fact about him is that he wrote books on farting! Today, however, I’ll concentrate on his early life, his rise to fame and his connection to the Midsummer Day of the Ox.

Let’s start, though, with the Day of the Ox itself. The day gets it name from its location in the Chinese calendar, which the Japanese used from the 6th century until 1873. Just like the Chinese New Year, the Midsummer Day of the Ox is not a fixed date and varies from year to year. The day was known to the Japanese for centuries, but how did eels become specifically associated with it?

There’s a traditional Japanese saying that says that if you eat eels on Midsummer Day of the Ox you won’t suffer from the heat, and it gets scorching hot in Japan at this time of year, as I’m sure we can tell by watching the Olympics.

The eels became important during the Edo Period (1603-1868). This is also called the Tokugawa Period because it was founded by the shoguns of the Tokugawa dynasty. This is a family that my most regular readers may remember from older articles. The fifth shogun, Tokugawa Tsunayoshi (1646-1709), was the subject of this article I wrote in 2019. I also mentioned his father here.

During the hot summers of Tokugawa Period Japan eels were not eaten very often. It wasn’t regarded as a summer food. Eel vendors were finding it difficult and unpredictable to sell all their eels, and the price varied according to demand. A couple of generations after the above-mentioned shogun there was one eel vendor who complained about not knowing from one day to the next if he’ll have to throw away most of his unsold produce.

It is fortunate that this vendor turned to Hiraga Gennai for advice. Hiraga came up with an effective marketing strategy. He told the vendor to put up a sign outside his shop saying “Midsummer Day of the Ox”. Of course, everyone knew what day it was, but Hiraga suggested to the vendor that he promote the eating of eels to keep cool during the summer heat. The idea worked, and the vendor sold all his eels. After that, all the other eel vendors followed suit, and it soon turned into an annual tradition.

That’s the legend. There’s no real evidence that it happened like that but it illustrates the influence of Hiraga Gennai in Japanese culture, particularly his reputation as a product marketer. To this day historians aren’t sure why this marketing plan worked. So, how great was Hiraga? Is his reputation as a Japanese Leonardo da Vinci justified? I’ll take a closer look at these questions next week, but for today let’s look at his early life.

Hiraga was born into a samurai family of the Yamashita clan. His father was a manager in the rice warehouse of the Takamatsu daimyo (or feudal lord) and young Hiraga showed an early interest in plants and herbs. He studied medicinal herbs at Osaka and was then employed as a sort of pharmacologist in the herb garden of his daimyo.

In 1749, at the age of 21, Hiraga succeeded his father as warehouse manager. He spent two years studying in Nagasaki, where he came into contact with European merchants, specifically the Dutch. On his return to the rice warehouse he resigned and relinquished his position of head of his household to his brother-in-law.

After travelling and studying around Japan he gained a reputation as an intelligent scholar and was called upon by his daimyo to perform several official duties. Once again, Hiraga resigned. He was no what you could call an independent spirit, a ronin, a samurai not attached to any feudal lordship. As such he was not allowed to serve any official duty. This gave him the freedom to continue studying and travelling. He gained more experience of Dutch culture and this influenced his future career which, in turn, influenced Japanese culture.

It is from this time that Hiraga Gennai turned into one of the most extraordinary men in 18th century Japan. This will be the focus of part 2 of this look at this Japanese da Vinci, which will appear sometime in March 2022.

The Seven Voyages of ...

…no, not Sinbad, but an equally intrepid explorer who also encountered visited distant lands, saw strange creatures and battled pirates on the high seas. He would surely have become the hero of tales in the “1001 Nights” had he lived centuries earlier. He is legendary in the country of his birth, and was even celebrated in one of the most ostentatious (and unnervingly intimidating) Olympic opening ceremonies ever. His names was Zheng He (1371-1433) and he was admiral of the Treasure Fleet of the Ming emperor of China.

There are several similarities between Zheng He and the legendary Sinbad. Both were Muslims, both sailed through the Indian Ocean many times, and both may have sailed further than anyone else in their lifetime.

A wax figure of Zheng He in the Quanzhou Maritime Museum, Fujian Province, China.

Zheng He was born into a Muslim family in Kunming in Yunnan, in what is now a province of China but was then a semi-independent region still ruled by the former imperial Mongol dynasty. Zheng’s birth name was Ma He. Islam had spread to south-east Asia several centuries earlier through trade routes and there’s still millions of Muslims in Yunnan province today. Zheng was descended from the first Governor of Yunnan, appointed by Kublai Kahn. It is claimed Zheng descends from the Prophet Mohammed through his governor ancestor. This is very possible, though no complete record of that descent exists. It is also believed that Zheng’s father took the pilgrimage to Mecca, the Hajj.

When he was about 10 years old Yunnan was invade by the Ming army. Zheng’s father was killed and he was captured. Almost immediately he was subjected to the usual punishment given to male captives – castration, and he became a eunuch.

Eunuchs in Ming China were mainly captured slaves. They were generally regarded as non-male and non-female and could be regarded as a third gender in a way similar to some members of the hijra community of the Indian subcontinent. Most of the Ming eunuchs worked at the imperial court and civil servants often regarded them with suspicion and condescension. Being close to imperial ears eunuchs could be chosen to act as spies against court officials. It was possible, therefore, to eunuchs to be trusted by the emperor and rise in power above the court official who despised them.

Zheng became a slave of the Prince of Yan, Zhu Di, the governor of Beijing. Zheng came to earn the prince’s trust and took a leading role in many of his military campaigns. In 1402 Prince Zhu became emperor. It was the new emperor that Zheng was bestowed with that name in place of Ma. From that moment it was a quick rise in the military ranks for Zheng and he become a diplomat, admiral and Grand Director of the seven voyages of the Treasure Fleet.

The emperor devised these treasure voyages in 1403 and set about constructing the fleet. The treasure the ships were to carry was gold, silver, rich brocades and silks, and porcelain to foreign lands in exchange fore rich goods to bring back to China. They also carried envoys and diplomats with letters from the emperor to give to foreign heads of state and transport foreign ambassadors back to China with their treasures to give to the emperor.

The treasure ships were huge. When Columbus “sailed the ocean blue” across the Atlantic 90 years later he could have fitted ten of his ships inside just one of those treasure ships. Not only that, but each Treasure Fleet consisted of 300 ships, including the treasure ships themselves as well as supply ships and military ships. Imagine seeing those sail over the horizon straight towards you. Likewise, there was a massive crew, up to 27,000 people on each voyage.

In recent years, especially since the 400th anniversary of the sailing of the first voyage, more interest has been taken in Zheng He and the Treasure Fleet. During the opening ceremony of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games there was a section devoted to Zheng He in which hundreds of men dressed in blue waved 20-feet-long paddles in the air to represent the waves of the sea (above). When the paddles were held up together they showed paintings of the Treasure Fleet. At the end of their section they formed the outline of one of those massive ships.

Among the more recent documentaries about Zheng He is shown below. It shows better the routes of his voyages and gives some new theories about his influence in the countries he visited. 

The Thousand Arms of Compassion

There’s a story in Mahayana Buddhist belief of a deity who vowed never to rest until all humanity and sentient life was free of suffering. Struggling to hear and distinguish all the cries of the world his head split into eleven pieces. Amitabha, the King of Buddhas, saw the deity’s dilemma and gave him eleven heads to hear the cries more clearly. When the deity heard the cries he reached out to comfort them all, but there were too many and his arms shattered. Amitabha came to his aid again and gave him a thousands arms. With these the deity found he could at last comfort any who call his name for help.

The deity’s name is Avalokitesvara (the pronunciation is given in the video below), the most important deity after Buddha. If you’re a Buddhist yourself you’ll know all about him, so I apologise in advance (being a Methodist) if I misunderstand him. Avalokitesvara’s name evolved from a Sanskrit phrase meaning “the lord who looks down on to the sounds of the world”, the sounds being the cries of the suffering.

Avalokitesvara is a bodhisattva, a deity who is on a path to becoming a Buddha, is venerated across the whole of south-east Asia and the Indian subcontinent and has many, many different names and attributes, including a female form named Kuan-yin or Guanyin.

Because of the dual gender representations of Avalokitesvara many transgender communities in the West have begun to use the female Kuan-yin as an icon of transgender identity. Whether this will become more generally accepted is a matter of time, but it is somewhat inappropriate because Kuan-yin and Avalokitesvara, female and male, are the same deity and exist simultaneously.

But let’s look at how this deity came to exist in two genders.

The earliest written reference to him is in the 1st century in the “Lotus Sutra”. It describes Avalokitesvara as an attendant of Amitabha. The 25th chapter of the sutra describes him as compassionate and kind and among the highest deities in Buddhist cosmology. The chapter contains descriptions of 33 manifestations that Avalokitesvara can take, male and female, young or old, or any form, depending on the needs and context of the help that is required.

The 4th century “Karandavyuha Sutra” is devoted entirely to Avalokitesvara. This sutra is also the origin of the well-known mantra “Om mani padme um”.

Historians are not sure how old the veneration of Avalokitesvara is. It may have begun in northern India, perhaps in Kashmir. From there Avalokitesvara spread with Buddhist belief eastward across Tibet and into China, and south to cover the rest of India and east to the rest of Asia.

As Buddhism spread its scriptural texts were translated, and in 1st century China the name Avalokitesvara was translated as Guanyin, more popularly Kuan-yin in the West. The translated name means the same as Avalokitesvara - “the lord who looks down on to the sounds of the world”.

The world’s largest statue of Kuan-yin, the Sendai Daikannon in Japan. It represents Kannon, the Japanese name for Kuan-yin. It is 100 metres high. Between 1991 and 1993 it was the tallest statue in the world. Currently it is the 5th tallest. In the top 30 tallest statues in the world 11 are of Kuan-yin.

There are several theories why Kuan-yin became a predominantly female manifestation. One is that her worshippers in Tibet integrated her into another female deity called Tara. Another is that she somehow became associated with the legendary Chinese princess called Miao Shan. Perhaps Chinese culture in the early centuries saw compassion as a more feminine trait and depicted Kuan-yin accordingly.

Before the Song dynasty (960-1279) images of Kuan-yin in China show her as either male or female, illustrating the variations of forms Avalokitesvara can take, as described in the “Lotus Sutra”. Gradually the female image began to predominate.

There are thousands, possibly millions, of images and statues of Avalokitesvara in all his manifestations around the world where Buddhist belief exists. Each Asian nation and regional branch of Buddhism has a different name and preferred gender identity for the deity. The thousand-armed manifestation I mentioned at the start is one of many. In other countries Avalokitesvara has fewer arms, and usually just two.

Kuan-yin’s growing popularity among the transgender community began at the end of the last century in the USA. Just why the manifestation of Kuan-yin was preferred is not fully explained. Avalokitesvara did not change gender to become Kuan-yin because he still exists as a male deity. There are also some male images of Kuan-yin still being produced. If anything Kuan-yin could be described as intersex or agender. I don’t claim to provide any answers to what gender identity best describes Avalokitesvara, Kuan-yin, and the hundreds of other names and manifestations this deity exhibits.

There is a lot we still have to learn and understand about the world’s spiritual deities and their meaning before we impose Western-defined gender identities upon them, especially by people of a different faith, belief or culture. Cultural appropriation is a tricky area.

Every role model in any community fulfils a specific purpose and perhaps Kuan-yin gives a new insight into gender and transgender identity that others have yet to realise. Above all the deity is a compassionate one. Perhaps that is what should be brought forward for Kuan-yin as a transgender role model. The transgender community goes through so much pain and abuse that compassion may be what it needs more than anything else, and Kuan-yin provides just that.

Below is a video that explains Avalokitesvara is more detail.

 

Extraordinary Life: A Queer Action Hero - Part 2

In May I wrote about the early travels of Richard Halliburton (1900-1939), one of the forgotten adventurers of the inter-war years. I left the story with the arrival of the Great Depression. Richard’s finances took a dive as the lecture circuit and book sales began to fall away. Richard decided the only thing that could save his family from plunging into poverty was … to go on another round the world trip and write another book about it.

The new adventure was to fly around the world in a biplane. There was just one problem. Richard couldn’t fly a plane. He found a pilot in the person of Moye Stephens (1906-1995), the recently elected President of the Professional Pilots Association. After considering several planes Moye chose a Stearman C-3B open dual cockpit plane which Richard bought with money from his celebrity endorsement of a coffee brand. Richard agreed to pay all expenses on the journey but he couldn’t pay Moye a salary. The deal was settled with a handshake. Fellow pilots thought Moye was mad to accept.

The plane was checked over and named The Flying Carpet. The venture began in earnest in January 1931 after the plane had been shipped across the Atlantic. During the first flight over France Richard noticed that the aileron pushrods controlling the fins on the wings were vibrating alarmingly. Landing in Paris the adventurers had to wait three weeks for a technician to come from America to tell them that the pushrods had been put back in upside down when the plane was being checked over in America.

Front cover of the dust jacket for the first edition of “The Flying Carpet”, 1932.

There was no real itinerary, just a general west to east direction. First it was to Spain and North Africa. Richard got the urge to visit the legendary desert city of Timbuktu in present day Mali some 1,700 miles south across the Sahara. There he saw first hand the slave trade that made Timbuktu famous. Mali is one of the African nations that still practices slavery despite the attempts by French colonialists to abolish it.

It was then back to North Africa to spend time with the French Foreign Legion. Then to the Middle East. The sight of the plane in the skies caused quite a stir and several members of royal families persuaded Richard to give them a short trips.

After a few weeks the adventurers arrived in India where Richard revisited the Taj Mahal (no midnight dip in the ornamental pools this time). They then took a detour over Mount Everest. It was Richard’s 32nd birthday and he couldn’t resist standing up in the cockpit to take the first aerial photograph of Everest. He almost caused the plane to stall.

The final leg was around South East Asia. On Borneo Richard and Moye met the chief of a tribe of head-hunters. They gave his a trip in the Flying Carpet and he thanked them by presenting them with 60 kilos of shrunken heads. Not daring to cause offence the adventurers accepted the gift graciously. However, the heads soon began to stink and were thrown into the sea at the earliest opportunity.

After flying through a swarm of locusts the Flying Carpet arrived in the Philippines. There the plane was crated up and put aboard ship for the voyage home. The adventurers and the plane arrived back in San Francisco in April 1932.

Richard set to his next task of writing the book of the adventure which he titled “The Flying Carpet”. Richard moved in with Paul Mooney (1904-1939), a man he had met in San Francisco before the adventure, to write his book. It was published in November 1932. It is believed that Richard and Paul became a couple shortly afterwards.

Despite spending $64,000 on the Flying Carpet adventure and being in debt the royalties from the book earned Richard $100,000 in the first year. More lecture tours and commissions for travel articles followed, during which shorter travels abroad were undertaken. One was a recreation of Hannibal’s trek over the Alps with elephants.

With his new wealth Richard bought a cliff-top lot in Laguna Beach, California, and built a residence there in 1937. Because of its precarious position on the cliff end the house was called Hangover House. Richard and Paul moved in and Richard began writing two books for children called “Richard Halliburton’s Book of Marvels”. It is probably from the first of these that we get the false claim that the Great Wall of China can be seen from space, as he claimed. No-one knows where he got his information.

In 1939 Richard was getting itchy feet and began to plan his next adventure – to sail across the Pacific in a Chinese junk. With an eye for publicity his plan was to sail from Hong Kong to San Francisco in time for the Golden Gate International Exposition in April 1939. He would then take passengers around the bay. As usual he would be writing articles about the voyage and preparing another book. Hundreds of people contacted him hoping to be chosen as a crew member.

The Sea Dragon in Hong Kong harbour.

The diesel-engined Chinese junk was built from scratch in Hong Kong and was named Sea Dragon, but delays and a failed trial voyage meant that they wouldn’t reach America in time for the Exposition. His crew included Paul, twelve other men and was captained by John Wenlock Welch.

The voyage began well but into the third week the Sea Dragon encountered the Pacific’s notoriously strong currents and storms. On 23rd march they sent a radio message to the liner SS President Coolidge battling the storms halfway between Japan and Midway Island. The Sea Dragon was some miles south. The liner received a cheery message, then one which said (edited) “Southerly gale. Heavy rain squalls. High sea … All well. When close may we avail ourselves of your direction finder…”

That’s the last anyone heard from the Sea Dragon. SS President Coolidge went to its last reported position and found nothing and there was no reply to their radio messages. The Coast Guard on Hawaii were alerted but they thought it was a publicity stunt and didn’t rush into a search and rescue. When it seemed clear it was not a prank the US Navy undertook a massive search of the area, but to no avail.

The disappearance of Richard Halliburton and his crew shocked America. Only two years earlier the famous aviator Amelia Earhart had disappeared and is still a story that attracts attention. Despite Richard’s equal celebrity status his disappearance gradually faded from our collective memory. Perhaps it was swallowed up with the start of World War II that same summer.

The life of Richard Halliburton has received a slow revival over the past three decades or so with several new biographies. The disappearance of the Sea Dragon is brought back to life in a book published a couple of days ago by the University of Tennessee Press called “Richard Halliburton and the Voyage of the Sea Dragon” by Gerry Max. With rare photographs and recently researched documents new life has been given to the last adventure of a forgotten gay traveller and action man Richard Halliburton.

There’s a sad postscript to this story. Just a few weeks ago the Pacific claimed another life of an openly lgbt adventurer. Paralympian Angela Madsen was making a solo row across the Pacific but was overcome in the ocean storms. I’ll write a memorial article to her, and to another brave Paralympian, Marieke Vervoort, next month.

80 More Gays Around the World: Part 13) Eastern Trade

Last time on “80 More Gays”: 33) David Mixner (b.1946) was an anti-Vietnam War campaigner when 34) Leonard Matlovich (1943-1988) was serving there before being discharged because he was gay, as was 35) Frank Kameny (1925-2011), both being among many people discharged from the US armed forces since the first, 36) Frederik Gotthold Enslin (c.1740-after 1778) who escaped the death penalty, until his fellow Dutchman 37) Joost Schouten (c1600-1644).

37) Joost Schouten was one of the leading colonial administrators of the Dutch East Indies Company, the VOC, in the early 17th century. The VOC was the biggest trading organisation in the world at that time. It was founded to obtain spices and luxury goods from East Asia for the European market. Its operations spread from the Indonesian islands to Siam (modern Thailand) and Japan.

Joost Schouten joined the VOC in 1622. He was posted to their trading post at Ayutthaya in Siam. Shortly after he arrived East Asia trade was becoming unprofitable and the Ayutthaya post was closed down. Joost was chosen by the company to remain to buy and store merchandise and to act as a diplomatic agent. Two years later the post reopened.


The flag of the Dutch East Indies Company (the VOC) from 1630.

Joost was reassigned to an exploratory trade mission to Japan in 1625 as secretary to the Dutch colonial governor Willem Janszoon. He returned to Siam after the mission. Incidentally, Janszoon had been the first European to see Australia.

The VOC closed its Ayutthaya post again in 1629 and Joost returned to Japan as their Dutch envoy. At this time the shogun, the military ruler, of Japan was Tokugawa Hidetada, though he had actually abdicated his powers to his son 38) Tokugawa Iemitsu (1604-1651).

Diplomatic relations between Japan and Siam were becoming strained, particularly after the usurpation of the Siamese throne in 1629. Japanese nationals were being victimised in Siam and Shogun Iemitsu refused to receive a Siamese diplomatic mission. This led eventually to the foreign policy adopted in Japan in 1641 that effectively cut off Japan from the rest of the world.

Joost Schouten was on the move again, and back to Siam, and the Ayutthaya trading post was opened once again. Joost was appointed its “opperhoofd”, the chief executive officer. On several occasions Joost was appointed ambassador and trade negotiator to the king of Siam.

The emblem of the Tokugawa dynasty.

In 1641 all hope Joost had of getting back to Japan were dashed when Shogun Iemitsu banished all Europeans. Without this trade link the VOC began to seek new markets and approved an expedition led by Abel Tasman to sail around the bottom of the new continent of Australia. Tasman’s voyage was equipped by Joost Schouten. On this expedition Tasman named an island after Scouten and “discovered” New Zealand.

Joost Schouten’s downfall came in July 1644. He had been reported to the VOC for homosexual acts and he was put on trial with several of his partners. Joost pleaded guilty and admitted to having sex with men since his first arrival in Siam some 22 years earlier.

Homosexuality was a capital offense for the Dutch. Those found guilty were either burned at the stake or drowned. Joost was found guilty and sentenced to be burned at the stake. His partners were sentenced to be drowned. However, because of Joost Schouten’s distinguished service to the VOC they decided he deserved to be spared the pain of his punishment, so they strangled him to death first and then burned his corpse at the stake.

Whether Shogun Tokugawa Iemitsu ever heard of Joost Schouten’s fate is uncertain. Japan had a totally different attitude to male homosexuality. It was similar to the relationships of ancient Greece in which adult men took younger lovers. The Japanese called their same-sex tradition “shudo” or “”wakashudo” and was common practice among the samurai class.

Even though Shogun Iemitsu had several wives and numerous female concubines he is also known to have had at least three male partners under the system of shudo. One story goes that as a child Iemitsu became the boy lover of an older courtier named Sakabe Gozeamon. In 1617, at the age of 13, Iemitsu was installed as heir to the shogunate. It was now expected for him in due course to take his own younger lover. Instead he and Gozeamon continued to be partners. One day in 1620, as the couple were sharing a bath, Iemitsu noticed that Gozeamon was showing a lot of attention to a younger courtier. He murdered Goeamon in a jealous rage.

Shogun Iemitsu is thought by some modern European historians to have preferred sex with men despite his many wives, concubines and children. His most famous son eventually became shogun himself in 1680. This is a man I have written about before because of his introduction of laws protecting dogs. Consequently he is known as the Dog Shogun, but his official name was 39) Tokugawa Tsunayoshi (1646-1709).

I won’t repeat what I wrote in that earlier article, but I’ll mention a national festival which became popular during his rule and is still celebrated on 15th November. The festival is called Shichi Go San, which literally means “7, 5, 3”. It celebrates the various stages in a child’s development at those ages.

Tradition says that Shichi Go San was made popular by Shogun Tsunoyoshi in celebration of his own son and the idea soon spread. It is said he set the festival date to 15th November, the date of an old festival that celebrated he harvest.

This brings me to perhaps the most well-known harvest celebration which also originated in this period, the Thanksgiving in the American colonies. We’ll continue with an American colonial contemporary of Shogun Iemitsu and Joost Schouten, who shared the latter’s fate of execution for sodomy, 40) William Plaine (c.1595-1646).

Next time on “80 More Gays”:  We take a break and catch up on the first 39 “Gays” before continuing with number 40 later in the month.