CAMBODIA: Additionally to the two genders, male and female, Cambodia’s national language Khmer also knows the third gender kteuy, describing a person who has the physical characteristics of one gender but the behavior of the other.
JAPAN: One of our highlights and on top of our bucket list for our Japan Travels was without any doubt our two-nights stay at a Buddhist monastery in the mountains of Mount Koya in the South of Osaka.
VIETNAM: Homosexuality was still described as a social evil by a national television broadcaster in 2002, comparable to prostitution and illegal gambling. Over the past years, the situation for the LGBT community in Vietnam has improved.
MYANMAR: …or Burma, still one of the most conservative countries in Southeast Asia, is also the country where life is anything but easy for LGBTQ+ people
The Southeast Asian state of Brunei Darussalam has massively tightened the laws on same-sex intercourse. The revision of the Sultanate’s Criminal Code, which will come into effect next Wednesday, provides for the death penalty for homosexuals by stoning. This rule also applies to foreigners, and therefore also lesbian and gay tourists, who are in the country on the island of Borneo. In the strictly conservative sultanate, homosexuality was already illegal under current Sharia law.
BERLIN: At the recent international tourism fair in Berlin, the Minister of Tourism of ITB partner Malaysia caused a scandal at the opening press conference.
The Spartacus Gay Travel Index 2019: Every year, the German publisher of gay travel information and guide books releases the annual Gay Travel Index with a detailed ranking of 197 LGBTQ+ friendly countries worldwide. In the 7th edition, Berlin-based Spartacus gives lesbian, gay and queer travelers information about how gay-friendly a holiday destination is according to several ranking factors and criteria collecting enough information about LGBTQ+ friendliness and livability for locals. Gay travelers can use this information to prepare for their gaycation as well as taking it as a piece of advice for choosing the holiday destination.
On February 2nd, 2019 over 15.000 people joined the Mumbai Gay Pride to celebrate the freedom of homosexuality. It was the first time after India’s Supreme Court decriminalized Section 377 in September 2018, a colonial law that declared gay sex to be illegal. The parade that started from Mumbai’s August Kranti Maidan – where Mahatma Gandhi began the Quit India Movement against the British occupation in 1942 – included 27 events to raise awareness for the LGBTQ+ community and educate people about it. We selected some of the most colorful and powerful pics of the gay pride event in India sharing the love and success of the openly queer event Mumbai Pride 2019 on Couple of Men.