My second five are: Botswana, Solomon Islands, Maldives, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Yemen.
What I’ve noticed so far is that the countries that punish homosexuality tend to belong to either of two camps: 1. An Islamic country under Sharia law (usually punishes by lashing, stoning and imprisonment) or, surprise, surprise, 2. a former British protectorate/colony (using ancient British penal code that declares homosexual activity an unnatural offence/indecent practice between persons, usually punishes with years of imprisonment). No comment on the Islamic states but I do hope Britain will do more to clean up the messes it started.
In the wake of Brunei’s decision to stone to death those who admit to homosexual activity (or those who have been unfortunate enough to have been seen by four eyewitnesses when indulging in so), I’ve decided to dedicate my next few Long List of Lesbians additions to providing information on places where lesbian activity could get you punished because, really, who wants to be arrested, detained, caned, stoned or die when on holiday, right? My first five entries on this topic are in Asia and Africa: Brunei, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Mauritania, Nigeria.
Playing: InstLife (Android), Shadow of the Tomb Raider (PS4)
Reading/Read: 90 Minutes in Heave by Don Piper, The Art of Power by Thich Nhat Hanh, The Eleventh Day by Anthony Summers, Toxic Parents by Susan Forward, The Emotionally Absent Mother by Jasmine Lee Cori, The Art of Disappearing by Ajahn Brahm, The Teaching of Buddha by ? (was a free book I got from a hotel room in Myanmar), Grieving the Loss of a Parent by Silas Henderson, The New Testament by ? (was a book on a shelf at the hospice my mum was warded at).
Thinking a lot about: Business building, quitting coffee, religion, life.
My partner likes to veg out to random movies before bed and on one of the nights recently, the movie that got lucky was the Hong Kong-Taiwan-and maybe China production, Girls 2, also known as Girls vs Gangsters I think. I prefer reading before bed so I usually seldom pay much attention to anything she puts on, but for Girls vs Gangsters, I found myself looking up, a lot, and eventually even put away my Kobo to watch the whole thing with her.
Before we go on, let me make it clear Girls vs Gangsters is not a lesbian movie. None of the characters are lesbians, the romantic storylines in the film are entirely heterosexual and they are very definitely identified as simply really good friends. It is also a very cheesy movie with a very slapstick plot that I’m not going to discuss here because, while I did have a few good laughs, I don’t really have much to say about it.
What I do want to mention, however, and this is also the reason I began watching and persisted with watching even as the story got covered in a layer of cheese thicker than my quilt, are the long gazes the lead actresses (there’s 3 of them and they are all gorgeous) would give each other, and the kisses they put on each other’s lips, and the tender hugs and caresses they would offer each another at every little opportunity, and the outright verbal expressions of ‘I love you’s. Basically, if you took away the rest of the film, exercised your imagination and put all those affectionate moments together with a little creative editing, you could probably get a beautiful, much-liked twenty-minute lesbian short film for YouTube out of it.
Like this… (Credit: YouTube)
… and this… (Credit: YouTube)
…. and this… (Seriously, there’s a ton more but I need to move on with life now.) (Credit: YouTube)
Confused, I picked out Girls 1 next and watched it for clues about what could really be going on, like if it could be something the director (who was also the writer) intended or if something was happening between the actresses in real life? I ended up finding more of those ‘I love you’s, pecks and hugs and professions to be there forever for each other, and even a scene where the 3 gorgeous leads strip off and jump into a shower together (yes, all 3, 1 shower, together), all in the name of being really good friends, and all while simultaneously professing an interest in dating/sleeping with men.
Just good friends.
Very good friends.
Very, very good friends. Yup.
Now, I don’t have a lot of heterosexual close female friends but the ones I do have, I will never kiss or hug or say ‘I love you’ to. And they neither have nor will to me, or each other, as far as I can tell. The close female friend that I did most recently kiss and hug and say I love you to became my partner. And for the record, we only began showering together after we started sleeping with each other.
So I have no idea what’s really going on in those movies, if it’s a culture or state of mind I don’t yet understand, or a means of making a film where girls get to kiss each other and show love for each other without the film being banned from or rejected by the box office? I don’t know. All I can tell you is that if you want to see very pretty, femmy Chinese actresses holding each other tightly, stroking each other lovingly, showing infinite concern for each other and proclaiming their love for each other without anybody making it into a very big deal at all, you will enjoy Girls 1 & 2.
I certainly did.
(Because it’s not properly a lesbian film though, I didn’t add it to my Long List of Lesbians. But I did only just add others, mostly in the United Kingdom section. Go here if you want to see.)
