IN Magazine: July/August 2022

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WHAT IT’S LIKE TO BE A BLACK QUEER REFUGEE IN UKRAINE READ THE HEARTSTOPPER BOOKS AND NOVELLAS IN ORDER BLACK AND QUEER HISTORIES MERGE IN OLUSEYE OGUNLESI’S PLAYFUL UNIVERSE HOW OUR FLAG MEANS DEATH IS REBUILDING THE TRUST OF QUEER VIEWERS 1

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DOVATO IS My Choice

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Is it time to rethink your treatment options?

DOVATO.CA DOVATO is dolutegravir + lamivudine in one pill

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inmagazine.ca PUBLISHER Patricia Salib GUEST EDITOR Christopher Turner ART DIRECTOR Georges Sarkis COPY EDITOR Ruth Hanley SENIOR COLUMNISTS Paul Gallant, Doug Wallace CONTRIBUTORS Jesse Boland, Olivia Burwell, Adriana Ermter, Mike Gosio, Gelareh Kamazani, Karen Kwan, Paul Langill, Luis Augusto Nobre, Em Norton, Rowan O’Brien, Ivan Otis, Brian Phillips, Mylo Whalen, Casey Williams, Jaime Woo, Adam Zivo DIRECTOR OF BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT Benjamin Chafe DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS AND COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT Jumol Royes CONTROLLER Jackie Zhao

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180 John St, Suite #509, Toronto, Ontario, M5T 1X5

ON THE COVER: PHOTO BY PHIL BOTHA ON UNSPLASH

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107 Issue 107 July / August 2022

The cathedral-like Black Ark art installation in Toronto by Nigerian-Canadian multidisciplinary artist Oluseye Ogunlesi.

Read Paul Gallant’s interview with Ogunlesi on page 46. Photo by Cassandra Popescu

INFRONT

06 | IN THE MIX When a product’s ingredient is more than just a trend, it becomes a beauty and grooming game-changer

08 | WHEN WILL ENOUGH BE ENOUGH? A reminder that we should be celebrating Pride all year long, because one month simply isn’t enough

10 | SHOW SOME PRIDE IN YOUR FAVOURITE RIDE A few tips to get your car shining “bright like a diamond” for the summer

18 | A GAY STORYLINE ON MY FAVOURITE SOAP MADE ME FEEL SEEN Authentic LGBTQ2+ representation in media matters, because we exist in every story 20 | HERE’S WHAT ORDER TO READ THE HEARTSTOPPER BOOKS AND NOVELLAS While you eagerly await Season 2 of this hit series, here’s our guide to the four Heartstopper graphic novels and novellas 22 | WHAT IT’S LIKE TO BE A BLACK QUEER REFUGEE IN UKRAINE Ukraine has been a safe haven for many foreign nationals. But now what?

11 | THE CERCLE ORANGE STORY Health care is not truly universal until everybody has access

26 | “OUT” AS IN…WHAT EXACTLY? As is to be expected for a community represented by a rainbow flag, things aren’t exactly black and white

12 | GET HEALTHY LIKE A PELOTON INSTRUCTOR Tips and advice from Jess King, Adrian Williams, Ross Rayburn and Callie Gullickson

30 | RETHINKING THE ROMANTIC COMEDY Let’s keep pushing what the romantic comedy can look like

FEATURES

48 | THAILAND IS YOUR NEW SANCTUARY The country has lifted travel restrictions, and is once again ready to welcome the world to its lavish palaces and ancient ruins, breathtaking beaches and secret waterfalls 50 | PRINCELY IN PRINCE EDWARD COUNTY The stellar and stately Merrill House leads a growing list of burgeoning boutique hotels in Ontario’s favourite weekend playground 54 | FLASHBACK: JULY 17, 2008 IN LGBTQ+ HISTORY Angie Zapata is murdered 55 | 8 QUESTIONS WITH CARTOONIST NAKEDPASTOR David Hayward reminds us that a picture’s worth a thousand words FASHION

14 | THE RELIEF AND ANXIETY OF REJECTING PERFORMATIVE FEMININITY After years of slowly realizing how I want to present my gender, I finally took the next big step 16 | HOW OUR FLAG MEANS DEATH IS REBUILDING THE TRUST OF QUEER VIEWERS The HBO pirate comedy tells stories of swashbuckling and love on the high seas

46 | BLACK AND QUEER HISTORIES MERGE IN OLUSEYE OGUNLESI’S PLAYFUL UNIVERSE An interview with the Nigerian-Canadian multidisciplinary artist based in Toronto

32 | UNCHAINED MELODY The new Fetish Collection from Addicted USA is sweet and soulful to men’s rears THIS ISSUE OF IN MAGAZINE IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY

34 | LOVE SONG Love is in the air, everywhere we look around

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LOOKING GOOD

IN THE MIX When a product’s ingredient is more than just a trend, it becomes a beauty and grooming game-changer

JULY / AUGUST 2022

By Adriana Ermter

Photo by Megumi Nachev on Unsplash

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We’ve seen (and the brave have tried) everything from vibrating mascara wands and app-driven body-contouring gadgets to poresucking face vacuums and exfoliating razor blades. Yet in the background of all of this whirring and twirling, scientists continue to diligently research and mixmaster unique ingredients to create game-changing formulas for skin care, hair care, body care and even fragrance. Here are five of our favourites to try right now.

#1

INNOVATIVE INGREDIENT : KOMBUCHA indirubin (which helps strengthen and support the skin’s barrier), Even if you haven’t yet sipped it (which makes us say, What??? the little plant that could is swirled into multiple brands’ skincare because kombucha tea is refreshingly delicious), you’ve most likely formulas, including Indigoblue Skincare, La Mer, Glossier and, heard of it. Well, guess what, the same fermented ingredient is now of course, Tatcha. a skincare favourite with brands such as Murad, Pacifica Beauty and Fresh. It has antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, antioxidant INNOVATIVE INGREDIENT : UPCYCLED FOOD and anti-carcinogenic properties, and a 2021 study by Scientific ‘Waste not, want not’ is not a new phrase or concept. Most people Reports claims kombucha helps prevent signs of aging, while lightly heard it as children at the dinner table. Many have even used exfoliating the skin and adding a healthy glow. The tart ingredient upcycled shampoo, soap and skincare products without knowing it. is also beneficial for helping maintain moisture and elasticity, So what’s the hype? Companies such as UpCircle Beauty, Superzero while providing the appearance of an even skin tone and texture. and Farmacy Beauty are now transparent and vocal about their focus on upcycling ingredients and their viability to reduce costs INNOVATIVE INGREDIENT : XYLITOL via reductions in wasteful practices. According to Whole Foods Recently, hard-to-pronounce xylitol has become renowned as Market, favoured foods for upcycling and reformulating into a primary ingredient in toothpaste tablets (you know, the small skincare products include coffee grounds, charcoal, blueberryChiclet-like squares of hard toothpaste offered by brands like Hello, seed oil, fruit-peel extracts, cacao-bean waste, apricot stones and Good Organics and Lush). According to the National Library of walnut-shell powder. Their benefits extend well beyond their Medicine, this natural sugar is extracted from fibrous fruits and exfoliating, cleansing, antioxidant and nourishing etc. properties. veggies such as berries, green beans, and corn on the cob. But These well-loved ingredients help preserve fresh water, limit it doesn’t break down like a regular sugar would and, instead, overharvesting and prevent greenhouse gases, while making good helps maintain a neutral pH level in your mouth. So when it’s use of leftover materials. mixmastered into minty formulas, xylitol can actually eliminate acid, prevent bacteria from sticking to your teeth and protect from INNOVATIVE INGREDIENT : MUSHROOMS cavities. Plus, along with eliminating spats about who left the tube While mushrooms have been sprinkled over salads, candied as off the toothpaste, xylitol-infused tablets are airplane friendly, heat treats and slipped into mouths as party favours for decades, their resistant and eco-friendly, as their formulas are void of the tiny popularity in creams, lotions and perfumes has made them a indestructible plastic polymers that regular toothpastes have us grooming mainstay in bathrooms. And not just because of their unknowingly spitting down the drain. intimate and musty scent quality: gender fluidity in skin care and perfumery is certainly a factor influencing the fungi’s growth, as INNOVATIVE INGREDIENT : JAPANESE INDIGO is its sensual universality with brands like Demeter, St. Paul’s This beautiful long-stemmed green plant with tiny pink bud-like Apothecary and Origins. Yet, according to research and development flowers is revered in its homeland Japan for its deeply soothing, company FlavorChem, all varieties of mushrooms in beauty and restorative and calming powers. According to beauty legend, Tatcha grooming products are now specifically sought out as part of the skincare’s Taiwanese-American founder Victoria Tsai discovered its wellness and self-care movement that exploded during COVID. anti-inflammatory properties in a 200-year-old beauty manuscript, Renowned for their positive, mood-boosting and stress-relieving which then prompted her to have the plant feature in her brand’s benefits, the mushroom’s earthy fragrance is believed to be calming skincare products. But Tsai isn’t alone; scientists around the globe and grounding, while providing a cool and edgy base for perfumes agree. Replete with nitrogen-rich compound trytanthrin (which and scented candles. helps eliminate toxins and irritants) and the isometric compound

#4

#2

#5

#3

“SCIENTISTS CONTINUE TO DILIGENTLY RESEARCH AND MIXMASTER UNIQUE INGREDIENTS TO CREATE GAME-CHANGING FORMULAS FOR SKIN CARE, HAIR CARE, BODY CARE AND EVEN FRAGRANCE. HERE ARE FIVE OF OUR FAVOURITES TO TRY RIGHT NOW” ADRIANA ERMTER is a Toronto-based, lifestyle-magazine pro who has travelled the globe writing about must-spritz fragrances, child poverty, beauty and grooming.

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LOOKING GOOD

Typically speaking, technology reigns in and as beauty and grooming’s most innovative products.

PRIDE AT WORK

WHEN WILL ENOUGH BE ENOUGH? A reminder that we should be celebrating Pride all year long, because one month simply isn’t enough

JULY / AUGUST 2022

By Luis Augusto Nobre

Photo by Alex Jackman on Unsplash

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However, it is really important to be conscious of the tokenism that many of us live in during the month of June. Although the Pride celebrations bring us together and help to build a sense of community and belonging, what else is left when the parties are over? The annual cycle of rainbows and festivities doesn’t affect only queer and trans communities, but it helps to create similar approaches to other identities beyond the queer acronym. Those communities and identities might experience these tokenistic celebrations in a different month or during other social events.

For any kind of celebration, we all have to keep in mind that we are who we are all year long. We don’t stop existing when the “special” month is over. Shouting that we deserve more is mandatory.

Shouting that we have had enough of injustice and exclusion is essential. Demanding the protection of our very basic right of existence is our main goal. If we don’t keep fighting for the end of inequities, we will continue experiencing violence. We will continue losing members of our communities. We will continue crying and doing minutes of silence for victims of atrocity. By the way, we are also those victims, because oppressive and supremacist systems target all of us.

In May, when Steve Kerr, head coach of the Golden State Warriors (a basketball team based in San Francisco), stopped a press conference and decided to not talk about the game, the players and the sport, but to share how exhausting it was to see victims of gun violence in the United States, he was taking action to call for assertive gun control actions and for protection of minorities from prejudiced violence. Recently, the US has experienced several mass shootings targeting Black (Buffalo, NY) and Latin (Uvalde, Texas) communities. And we cannot forget the mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, in 2016.

Those incidents are just a few examples of the oppression that we live under. Worldwide, violent cases against minorities are increasing, but they aren’t in the international media. When reported, they might get local headlines. For some inexplicable reason, they don’t gain the visibility they deserve, giving the impression that they are being swept under the carpet. But even when they are given visibility, our inertia doesn’t allow us to make any difference. It seems that only a few of us are committed and working hard to make a difference.

We as a society should do something else, something bigger, to stop those painful and fatal attacks. One minute of silence isn’t enough. Flags at half-mast aren’t enough. The hours of silence and indifference can only be over when we scream and march together.

We have to occupy the spaces and demand changes, protection and concrete actions. Marching in parades, and participating in

parties won’t be enough to fix the exclusionary circumstances lived by more marginalized members of our communities. We have to become more active social actors, leaving our workplaces and virtual environments. We have to stand up and say enough is enough. It isn’t fair. We cannot continue being targeted by these violent and oppressive systems anymore. It’s time to find a new path to stop the oppressive machine towards minority groups.

New leadership models are one solution. New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern once said that “we have placed over time so much emphasis on notions of assertiveness and strength that we have assumed it means you cannot have those other qualities of kindness and empathy.” Understanding what it’s like to be in another’s shoes would help people in power to address the necessary changes for a more inclusive society.

“WE DON’T STOP EXISTING WHEN THE ‘SPECIAL’ MONTH IS OVER” In some of his speaking engagements, Colin Druhan, Pride at Work Canada’s executive director, usually shares a personal anecdote about how powerful his voice has become in promoting workplace inclusion, consequently making workplaces better for everyone else as well. During one of his first job experiences in customer service, he often recalls, he tried to be a frontline worker, but his manager told him that his [gay] voice wasn’t appropriate to deal directly with customers. Well, guess what? Years later, his voice is recognized and heard by several (senior) leaders in this country when he talks about the importance of 2SLGBTQIA+ inclusion and the commitment that those leaders have to make to continue their DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) journey.

This piece is my perhaps naive attempt to combine Kerr’s argument that we cannot continue mourning victims of violence and prejudice without having a matching drive to put an end to the causes of all that violence and prejudice, with Ardern’s emphasis on the importance of developing new empathetic leadership models. New business models and new voices are fundamental to creating inclusive communities, listening to their voices, addressing their needs and ensuring their rights. More members from our marginalized communities are becoming the future leaders that we deserve, and bringing the changes that we have been expecting for so long.

Oddly enough, the advances we have all experienced are just the tip of the iceberg. You might think that what you have is enough for your life and for fulfilling your expectations, but I assure you that there are many people in our queer and trans communities who barely have their very basic needs considered by the people in power. To truly celebrate Pride Month, our colourful existence, and our beauty as diverse queer and trans communities, we have to celebrate and embrace others’ existence as well. Pride started as a protest and fight for our rights, and we should never forget those initial goals. It is why we should celebrate Pride all year long, because celebrating it only in June isn’t enough.

LUIS AUGUSTO NOBRE is the marketing and communications coordinator of Pride at Work Canada/Fierté au travail Canada, a leading national non-profit organization that promotes workplace inclusion on the grounds of gender expression, gender identity and sexual orientation. For more information, visit prideatwork.ca.

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PRIDE AT WORK

Pride celebrations are over in many places, as Pride month has ended. From now on, no more rainbows everywhere, no more lunch & learns, no more discussions – not until next year, when the new Pride cycle starts again. The colourful and celebratory season gives way to summer, ordinary life and several other events.

Okay, maybe I’m exaggerating. There will still be many Pride celebrations happening in the country until the end of summer, and several employers are pushing forward 2SLGBTQIA+ inclusion in the workplace. I am a witness to this movement.

WHEELS

SHOW PRIDE IN YOUR FAVOURITE RIDE A few tips to get your car shining “bright like a diamond” for the summer

By Casey Williams

We may be halfway through summer, but it’s never too late to shine up, wash down, and show some bling with these auto accessories.

You’ll cut a swath wherever you go this summer.

Bath time is fun Putting hands on your car for a good scrub-down only rivals one with your special lovey-dove. But you’ll need some accessories.

Throw out last year’s bucket and get a new one so you don’t scratch paint with old dirt. Same for your sponge, chamois and interior cloth. And don’t use household cleaners: buy a dedicated car wash soap from Meguiars, Armor All or others at your local auto store.

Finish it off with a spray of tire shine. Set aside $15 for a sponge, $20 for a chamois, $25 for car wash liquid, and $12 for tire shine.

Wax the body smooth Your body isn’t the only thing that needs waxing for bikini season – your car could use a buff and polish, too. One of the newest and easiest to apply is Turtle Wax Hybrid Solutions Pro Graphene Spray Wax. Simply wash your car and spray onto wet or dry paint, allowing 24 hours to cure. A glossy coat protects against water spotting, chemicals and the sun’s UV rays. Bonus: unlike body waxing, you only have to do this every 12 months. Price: $33.

Condition those supple hides Wrinkles and cracks don’t look good on your hide, and they don’t look good on your car’s either. It’s important to take a little pride in your leather seats, especially if your car rests in the hot summer sun: use cleaner and conditioner to prevent dirt breaking down the leather, and a conditioner to keep it supple. Many brands are available, but be sure to purchase a dedicated leather product and not a general-purpose auto cleaner. Armor All even offers leather wipes with the extra durability of ceramics. Price: $20.

JULY / AUGUST 2022

Cleans like a (John) Deere My college buddy turned me on to this product 20 years ago. Nothing cleans like a Deere! If it can bust mud and crud from cornfields, you can surely use it to wipe away doggie smudges and adventure smidgens. Buy the Classic Glass Cleaner at John Deere retailers or at deere.ca. Add cleaning towels and wheel/tire cleaner for a few dollars more. Whether you drive a tractor or a Tesla, you’ll really clean up with this set.

Drive human rights everywhere Add sparkle to your car while supporting our community: order an Equal sign from the Human Rights Campaign. The famous blueand-gold logos look good across your car’s backside, and buying one helps HRC do great work. Peel-and-stick emblems can be applied to your window or bumper, while newer magnet versions hug decklids. Go to hrc.org to make a donation and receive a sticker, or buy the bling magnetic version for around US$15.

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CASEY WILLIAMS is a contributing writer for Gaywheels.com. He contributes to the New York-based LGBT magazine Metrosource and the Chicago Tribune. He and his husband live in Indianapolis, where Williams contributes videos and reviews to wfyi.org, the area’s PBS/NPR station.

THE

CERCLE ORANGE STORY

Le Cercle Orange supports people living with HIV in Montreal who do not have access to health care. The project helps connect participants to medical, legal and community resources, including access to free medication and immigration support. It is often impossible for people in these groups to enter the healthcare system or pay for essential services. Resources for this population have existed in Montreal, but they have been limited, disconnected and difficult to navigate. We had the chance to interview Patrick Keeler, Cercle Orange’s founder and previous coordinator.

become a testament to the importance of the issue of health care for undocumented people. It has never been difficult for me to convince someone to jump on board and become a partner, to provide their services as part of our network of care. Everybody understands the need, and all of our sponsors and collaborators have been so generous with their time supporting the goals of the project. I think this shows that the government has a role to play, to ensure that we are truly supporting and treating everyone living with HIV, regardless of status.

Why is Cercle Orange an important project in the HIV landscape?

I began working in the Montreal HIV community in 2010. Since then I have worked in a variety of roles, providing one-on-one support, conceptualizing and coordinating workshops, training sessions and programs to improve support and break isolation. After witnessing the urgent needs of people living with HIV in Montreal who did not have access to health care, I launched Le Cercle Orange as a quick and bold city-wide response, with the vision that no one living with HIV in Montreal should be left behind. By collaborating with financial partners, we have increased the capacity of Cercle Orange to support anyone living with HIV in Montreal without access to health care, by establishing partnerships with hundreds of professionals, community leaders and peer navigators, private clinics, hospitals, legal resources and community organizations whose contributions are essential to the project’s success.

This project was not only compatible but was also harmoniously integrated in our partner’s long-term goals. During my time coordinating this project, I learned about ViiV’s approach to the development of HIV treatments, which centres around people living with HIV, partnering with AIDS Services Organizations, and founding initiatives to serve every community affected by HIV. This approach paid off for us and many other community organizations.

ViiV is the only global pharmaceutical company, solely focused on combating, preventing, and ultimately curing HIV/AIDS. By pledging to its vision to end the HIV/AIDS epidemic, ViiV has certainly left a footprint in the fight against HIV in the community.

What inspired you to start this project?

I’ve always been drawn to the community, and I’ve really enjoyed all the different roles I took on over the years. One of my more recent roles in the HIV world was providing information around HIV treatment with a local HIV organization. In that role, people living with HIV who didn’t have access to health care would approach us more and more often in need of support - international students, undocumented migrants, temporary workers - folks from a wide variety of backgrounds. They’d often come to us because they had no way of accessing medication or finding a doctor, yet no programs seemed to exist to help.

I knew that resources were out there. Many healthcare professionals have always been willing to see patients free of charge, programs through pharmaceutical companies exist that provide access to cost-free medication, and our city has so many fantastic community organizations. So the problem wasn’t a lack of resources, but that all of these resources were completely disconnected from each other and from the population, which made accessing them nearly impossible. A person without a wide array of contacts or extensive knowledge of this complex landscape would have no way of ever possibly knowing how to navigate existing resources. There was no system in place to harmonize these existing resources and make them accessible to the community. And that’s when the solution appeared. Around fall of 2019 is when I started speaking with ViiV Healthcare Canada and we created a Joint Partnership that became Cercle Orange.

What do you want people to know about health care and HIV? Health care is not truly universal until everybody has access.

This includes undocumented folks. This includes temporary workers and international students. It’s really disappointing that people living with HIV who don’t have access to health care are treated like second-class citizens in Canada. Cercle Orange has

Where do you see the Cercle Orange project going in the future?

I believe this project should expand. First, I think it could become a Quebec-wide program, and needs of this population are certainly not restricted to Montreal – and neither is our capacity to expand the model outside of the city. Second, to my knowledge, a project like this doesn’t exist anywhere else in Canada so I would love to witness the implementation of a project like this in other provinces.

Another aspect of the project that is extremely rewarding is seeing our participants enter the healthcare system so they no longer require the project’s support. For instance, we were contacted by an individual without legal status about a year ago, and connected them right away with a doctor, medication, and immigration support.

And very recently they became a permanent resident, obtained a health card, and are now helping us drive the project forward. Now that the project is two-and-a-half years old, we have begun to see these success stories like this, which is just amazing.

What is next for Montreal’s HIV community initiatives?

I would encourage everyone to get involved in their local HIVpositive initiatives. I am very excited that Montreal is one of the epicentres of medical and HIV research and houses multiple organizations dedicated to addressing the challenges of the HIV epidemic. The world’s largest conference on HIV and AIDS will be hosted in person in Montreal, as well as virtually, to make it accessible to as many people as possible. AIDS 2022 will take place this summer from July 29 to August 2, with pre-conference meetings beginning on July 27. We should all join the world of science to discuss HIV treatment innovations and contribute to ending this epidemic.

The conference will emphasize and reiterate the HIV epidemic as a threat to public health and individual well-being. Considering this topic is particularly dear to Cercle Orange, since the project is on the front lines of the battle to secure public health funding towards undocumented persons living with HIV, it is gratifying to see that support of our cause rightly occupies the centre stage at this conference.

For more information, visit www.cercleorange.ca.

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COMMUNITY

Health care is not truly universal until everybody has access

FITNESS

G E T H E A LT H Y LIKE A PELOTON INSTRUCTOR Tips and advice from Jess King, Adrian Williams, Ross Rayburn and Callie Gullickson

By Karen Kwan

JULY / AUGUST 2022

Jess King

Adrian Williams

Have you ever been in the middle of a Peloton workout and Plan your workout outfit coveted the instructor’s fit and healthy lifestyle? Here’s the thing: Wondering how the outfit you choose impacts your healthy routine? you can get healthy like a Peloton instructor. Although they seem Jess King likes to plan out her outfits for each workout in advance; like fitness superheroes, their healthy habits are simple, and you while this may seem a minor detail, feeling strong and confident can easily adopt these habits as your own. Take a peek into how in her look allows her to feel confident and strong in her workout.

Peloton superstars Jess King, Adrian Williams, Ross Rayburn and “I like to match the mood, too. If the ride or run is interval based Callie Gullickson approach their active lifestyles, and get set to or HIIT, I typically wear a monochromatic set with a high-impact give your routine a healthy revamp. sports bra and my hair braided and out of my face,” she says.

Alternatively, if the workout is all about the party and having fun, Create a morning routine you may have noticed that King wears bright colours (“most likely Having routines can help you carve out time in your day and decrease something that sparkles,” she says), and has her hair in a high pony stress. Establish one to improve your mornings – having a good so she can whip it around. routine helps to set your energy and mood for the day, says Callie Gullickson. She recommends staying off your phone first thing in Get enough sleep the morning, as this will help eliminate stress and distraction that “I take my sleep very seriously. I’ve noticed that not only my can then creep into your day. Another great habit to include in your physical but mental state benefits from rest and recovery,” says routine? Make your bed right away. “You’ll feel accomplished Gullickson. She gets about eight hours a night, and swears that and kick-start your work ethic for the rest of the day,” she says. it allows her to show up the next day with a clearer mindset and Lastly, Gullickson suggests drinking a glass of water to hydrate more productive mood. your body and mind.

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Ross Rayburn

Try another cardio workout instead. Williams adds that Peloton offers so many modalities, you’re sure to find something you love, whether you’re there for the music, the message or a great workout. In fact, Williams believes it should be fun first and fitness second. “If you enjoy the way movement makes you feel, your body remembers that joy and craves it. If you’re new to fitness, find the workout that gives you confidence and let that be the initial motivator,” he says.

Schedule your workouts in your calendar “Knowing when your workout will happen alleviates the stress of when or how your workout will take place so your mind can focus on other things during the day,” says King. Her own schedule fluctuates, so that means her workout schedule fluctuates as well.

“I find what is most helpful is not waiting until the day of to figure it out, but planning out my workouts for the week ahead by Friday and blocking them out in my calendar,” says King. “My workouts are non-negotiable, and I do everything I can to protect them from meetings and other responsibilities.” For King, her sweet spot is between 10:30 am and 3 pm. “While that may or may not happen, the workout will.” Figure out what your sweet spot is.

Callie Gullickson

you can get through quickly. “Use this workout – whether it’s yoga, strength, cardio or a combination – as a default on days you want to work out but aren’t feeling motivated. It can be a great way to stay consistent,” he says.

Have a snack before you exercise Do you find that you want something small to eat before you work out? Gullickson says you should listen to your body. She finds she craves a little something before moving her body. Her go-to snacks? Avocado toast, hard-boiled eggs, oatmeal or some fruit.

Pay attention to what snacks work best for you. “I’ve learned what works for my body and what gives me just the right amount of energy to get the most out of my workout,” she says Plan for rewards that will motivate you For some people, the reward might be a spa treatment, new workout clothes or a glass of wine. For King, it’s the results of a tough workout she finds rewarding, and instead of thinking of rewards, she looks forward to recovery. “Feeling confident and strong are the ultimate for me, and a hot Epsom salt bath, a nutrient-dense meal, a personal training session and eight hours of sleep are a delicious reward after a solid day of training,” she says.

KAREN KWAN is a freelance health, travel and lifestyle writer based in Toronto.

Follow her on Twitter at @healthswellness and on Instagram at @healthandswellness.

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FITNESS

Be in the right mindset .Give yourself a break if you need it When doing a Peloton workout, you’ll often hear the instructors Often, we beat ourselves up if we miss a workout. But Rayburn says reminding you of what a great job you’re doing. Make it a practice it’s okay to miss a day or two, and admits that he has days when to add affirmations to your workouts yourself, says Ross Rayburn. he just doesn’t feel like working out. If he’s had an active week, “Before, after and even during. It can be very simple like ‘Life is he gives himself permission to skip his workout. He also admits a gift,’ or ‘I’m determined to thrive.’” that he can “phone it in” occasionally. “I’ll do a very short, easy workout or yoga practice, and make sure to tell myself that was Have fun the perfect choice!” he says – so even Peloton instructors aren’t “Fitness looks so different for all of us. Finding the workout that is always feeling it. What is key is to be kind to yourself and your right for you mentally, physically and emotionally is important,” body. It helps, Rayburn adds, to have a turbo workout constructed says Adrian Williams. Are you in complete misery during a run? for yourself – one that covers a few different body parts, which

PRESENTING GENDER

THE RELIEF AND ANXIETY OF

REJECTING PERFORMATIVE FEMININITY After years of slowly realizing how I want to present my gender, I finally took the next big step

JULY / AUGUST 2022

By Em Norton

Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash

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PRESENTING GENDER

Recently, I cut my hair short for the first time. The trope of the “first queer haircut” being monumental is certainly not uncommon, and I’ll be honest, it felt like that for me. It was the first time I’d had short hair. And it was a long time coming in my to-do list of feminized-practices-I-want-to-give-up-but-don’t-out-of-guilt-andobligation. This haircut was a signed permission slip: I could let go.

Immediately, I was overcome with the tumultuous feeling of relief and freedom, but also anxiety and panic. Moving towards a gender presentation I’m comfortable with as a recently realized nonbinary person felt positive in so many ways, but it didn’t negate the years’ worth of performative femininity and expectations I’d been trying to uphold. The security blanket of long hair was the last strand of performative femininity I was clinging to, and now I feel like I’ve laid myself bare to the world.

Each practice, habit, mannerism and aesthetic choice I made could be attributed to what I’ve been taught the world wants from me: smallness, quiet, servitude, sexuality (but only the “pure” kind).

Coming out as queer nearly seven years ago, living openly as a queer person, and gradually changing my style choices has felt like chipping away at an ice block to find myself underneath the layers of self-preservation and conformity.

This isn’t to say I am not a feminine person. I actually feel very in touch with femininity and see it as an integral part of my identity alongside masculinity and gender nonconformity.

But in order to embrace femininity in the way I want to, I have to reject the ways I’ve been performing it for so long. This is certainly not an easy thing to do, but it is necessary in terms of gender affirmation and, frankly, life affirmation. And existing in the discomfort of conflicted feelings that my haircut spawned has strengthened my relationship to feminized aesthetics and behaviours.

Femininity has become more powerful to me since realizing I am not a woman, and cutting my hair made me feel like I had control over femininity.

When the chop first happened, I felt free. I sent photos to trusted loved ones and couldn’t stop touching the back of my neck, feeling the open space and room to breathe. After a weekend of living in my own queer little world, I left the house, ventured back to work, and showed off my cut a bit more widely on social media. That sense of freedom I first had was disrupted knowing other people’s perception of me was now altered, even slightly.

I’m the type of person who likes their comfort zone a bit too much.

And with this choice, I had left it. The feelings to come were uncomfortable, and though I couldn’t realize it right away, the discomfort was something I needed to feel and reflect on. I was panicking at the thought of being more visibly queer. I was staring in the mirror, over-analyzing and deciding it didn’t look good after all.

I was willing it to grow back, hang down my shoulders, shelter me.

But it was ultimately because of this prolonged sheltering that it took me so long to cut my hair in the first place. I’d wanted to for years, even before I realized I’m nonbinary, but wasn’t able to finally push myself to book the appointment until recently. Performative femininity was protecting me, or so I thought. It was protecting me

"Haircuts are certainly not the centrepiece of queer identity or feminine identity. But for me, it was a clear choice to be made in affirming myself as nonbinary."

from people questioning my identity and sneering at my queerness.

But it was harming me to not be myself outwardly.

Haircuts are certainly not the centrepiece of queer identity or feminine identity. But for me, it was a clear choice to be made in affirming myself as nonbinary. And despite the discomfort of leaving behind something that has been a part of my physical appearance for so long, I’m glad I did it. Making this choice for myself has allowed me to truly see femininity for all it’s worth and the ways in which it affirms me, as well as find new ways to experiment with it. The anxiety hasn’t completely disappeared. I still feel stressed when I can tell a family member is looking at me confusedly. But I feel confident when I challenge what is expected.

And even more confident when I like how it looks.

EM NORTON is a queer poet and writer from Toronto.

You can find more of Em’s work at emnortonwrites.com.

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HOW

OUR FLAG MEANS DEATH

IS REBUILDING THE TRUST OF QUEER VIEWERS

The HBO pirate comedy tells stories of swashbuckling and love on the high seas

By Rowan O’Brien

While scrolling on Instagram in mid-February, I noticed promos for a new pirate show popping up on my timeline, mostly from my favourite director/all-around-creator Taika Waititi and Vico Ortiz, a drag performer I had been thirst-following for a few years. Though I had seen little other promotion for Our Flag Means Death (I’m looking at you, HBO Max), I knew that if these two were involved, it was bound to be a good time. Fast-forward three months, and I am just finishing my fifth rewatch, have acquired a new wardrobe of florals and frills, and redecorated my room with some of the innovative fan art pouring out of the OFMD community.

AVAST, YE MATEYS! SPOILERS FOR OUR FLAG MEANS DEATH AHEAD! Our Flag Means Death is a historical workplace rom-com about the flamboyant nobleman turned incompetent pirate captain Stede Bonnet (Rhys Darby) and his crew of delightful misfits. At the end of the third episode, the infamous Blackbeard (Taika Waititi) finally catches up with Stede, and a tender bond is soon established between these two quirky captains. This meet-cute spirals into wild adventures, heart-warming moments and belly laughs as the relationship between Stede and Blackbeard (or Ed, as he prefers to be called) builds into a profession of love and an on-screen kiss.

JULY / AUGUST 2022

That’s right! A queer on-screen kiss between the two main characters of a sitcom on a mainstream platform! You can see why queer fans – who were hooked from the moment we saw the nonbinary pirate Jim (Vico Ortiz), or Black Pete and Lucius’s giggly hook-up, or, let’s be honest, Stede’s struggle to descend the ship’s wobbly ladder – exploded with glee (which would quickly turn to bittersweet frustration with the last episode of the series).

I had the exciting experience of watching the show as it was being released weekly (yes, I am bragging). As a queer viewer, I immediately recognized the underlying homoeroticism, and hoped against hope that the show would openly explore the love between Ed and Stede. However, having been misled before, I couldn’t actually allow myself to believe that a mainstream TV show would allow an explicit queer romance between the two main characters.

Even after the undeniable on-screen chemistry, even after creator David Jenkins tweeted, “Historical pirate rom-com. That’s it. That’s

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the pitch,” even after Waititi wished Darby (his “onscreen crush”) a happy birthday with a photo of the iconic toe-touch, even after we found out that Blackbeard had had a sexual relationship with his old buddy Calico Jack, and EVEN AFTER an episode literally titled “This Is Happening!,” I couldn’t get my hopes up.

A couple of days before the finale, I texted a friend and asked if he thought they would actually establish a romance between Ed and Stede by the end of the season. Both of us agreed that we couldn’t really count on the show to fully commit to the relationship. “On one hand, I have hope but on the other hand, I’ve been burned too many times before,” I complained. We then worried about another possible trajectory, and perhaps an even worse fate: if they admitted their love and then one of them immediately died. (*cough* Supernatural. *cough*) No matter how obvious it seemed to me, I couldn’t let myself completely trust Jenkins and the Our Flag Means Death writers’ room until Stede and Blackbeard kissed in the penultimate episode, at which point I audibly gasped. Our brains are designed to recognize pattern and story, so what happened in my queer little brain that caused the divide between my intuition and my faith in the show? The most likely culprit is queerbaiting, a marketing tactic most common in television and film, where a media entity entices LGBTQ+ viewers with the implication of queer content while never actually delivering.

Ed Teach (Taika Waititi) and Stede Bonnet (Rhys Darby) - Photo courtesy of HBO Max

Even though I had been ranting to my friends about how the characters’ love was undeniable, queerbaiting in TV and film has

Queerbaiting has damaged the queer community’s relationship with film and television. A lot of queer viewers, such as myself, have resorted to keeping supposed queer couples on-screen at arm’s length unless we have photographic evidence, such as a kiss, which arguably disrupts our ability to tap into the emotional journey of a story.

Stede Bonnet (Rhys Darby) and Ed Teach (Taika Waititi) - Photo courtesy of HBO Max

One popular example of queerbaiting is BBC’s Sherlock, which garnered a huge queer following due to the intimate relationship of John Watson and Sherlock Holmes, which was jokingly mistaken for a romantic one by other characters on the show. Similarly, and perhaps in response to all the criticism they received for teasing a romance between Dean Winchester and Castiel, Supernatural haphazardly had Castiel confess his love in the last season before being sucked into The Empty and effectively killed off. In a devastating blow to the Killing Eve fanbase, Villanelle recently met a similar fate in the show’s finale, an echo of her queer predecessor, Lexa in The 100. And sometimes, these relationships are even belittled by the creators, such as when the cast of Supergirl seemingly made fun of Supercorp, a popular queer ship between Kara and Lena, at San Diego Comic Con in 2017.

As queer people, we are accustomed to not seeing ourselves reflected on the screen, whether that is because a character is drenched in stereotype beyond recognition or just because there are no queer characters to be found. But queerbaiting seems to be an especially insidious form of ridicule. When you think you’ve finally found stable footing and then queerbaiting pulls the rug out from under you, you fall harder. Like Badminton’s ghost, you can almost hear your high school bully saying, “Did you REALLY think that they were going to be like you? Pathetic.”

In a recent interview with The Verge, David Jenkins spoke about the reaction to Our Flag Means Death, saying, “I think I didn’t realize – because I see myself represented on camera, and I see myself falling in love in stories – I didn’t realize how deep the queerbaiting thing goes. Being made to feel stupid by stories, I guess.” He continued, “[P]art of me felt like, ‘We’re going to do this story, and they’re going to kiss, and maybe that’s not even going to be that big a deal. Maybe it’ll just be a blip.’ But then, looking at how people were kind of afraid to let themselves believe that we were doing, that was a surprise to me, and it’s heartbreaking.”

OFMD not only avoided the use of queerbaiting and the Bury Your Gays trope (as far as we know, though we may have to wait for Season 2 to find out!), they also gifted us three unique queer romantic relationships. There is arguably also an unlimited number of queerplatonic relationships between The Revenge crew members, as OFMD makes use of the Found Family trope, a favourite in the queer community. Furthermore, they queered the familiar cliché of a woman dressing as a man to gain passage on a ship à la Elizabeth Swan in Pirates of the Caribbean, or the true stories of Anne Bonny and Mary Read, by using it as an opportunity to explore the gender complexity of Jim, the stowaway pirate, and easily incorporating the use of they/them pronouns into the show.

Since the release of the final two episodes, the OFMD fandom has exploded online. According to Parrot Analytics, it has been the number one Most In-Demand Breakout Series for almost eight weeks in a row, beating out even Marvel’s Moon Knight. The refreshing authenticity and care with which Our Flag Means Death handles queer stories is what has created such a devoted fanbase.

Scrolling through Twitter, I see hundreds of pieces of fan art that would make da Vinci jealous, and just two months after the finale there are already more than 6,700 Our Flag Means Death fan fiction pieces on Archive of Our Own. Additionally, the fandom is collaborating to explore in-depth future plot lines, as discussing Season 2 predictions is so much more engaging and joyful when the writers have queered the realm of possibility in your favour.

Stede Bonnet (Rhys Darby) and Ed Teach (Taika Waititi) - Photo courtesy of HBO Max

Watching Our Flag Means Death blew me out of the water like Calico Jack being hit by a cannonball. I could not believe a show like this actually existed. By avoiding the harmful queer tropes and instead providing fans with an exciting and carefully developed slow-burn romance, Our Flag Means Death is steadily rebuilding the trust of queer viewers that had been broken by so many TV shows before it. The explosive fandom and dedication to seeing the show renewed for another season indicates the desire for this kind of story on our television sets.

Having a concrete example of a mainstream queer love story, one that we could see coming from miles away, not only proves that we can trust our own instincts (and, sometimes, even TV show creators), but could also indicate more shows like Our Flag Means Death on the horizon as other networks take inspiration from this underdog hit.

You can watch Our Flag Means Death on HBO Max or through its Canadian provider, Crave.

ROWAN O’BRIEN is a queer writer and filmmaker based in Toronto who loves ranting about LGBTQ+ representation in media while creating their own queer stories. Their queer coming-of-age short film Crushed played at the Toronto Youth Shorts festival, and their next short film, City Limits, will be released this year.

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damaged my ability to trust my own perception to the point that I couldn’t believe my eyes when the exact outcome I had expected came to life.

PERSPECTIVE

A Gay Storyline On My Favourite Soap Made Me Feel Seen Authentic LGBTQ2+ representation in media matters, because we exist in every story

JULY / AUGUST 2022

By Jumol Royes

Photo by Sonja Flemming CBS

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PERSPECTIVE

"As a loyal fan of Y&R, I dreamed of the day when a same-sex storyline would take centre stage on the show and be celebrated."

Long before I fanboyed over the Real Housewives, I fell in love with The Young and the Restless.

I was first introduced to the show as a kid waiting to be picked up from my friend’s house after school. While my buddy and I procrastinated doing our homework, his babysitter made sure to keep one watchful eye on us and the other glued to the drama unfolding on the television screen. “Nadia’s Theme,” Y&R’s iconic opening song, was background music to my childhood.

In between playing silly games and running in and out of the house to grab something to drink, I couldn’t help but get sucked in by the daytime drama and its colourful cast of characters. I caught glimpses of the indomitable Katherine Chancellor, Genoa City’s grande dame, who always seemed to be feuding with her archnemesis, Jill; and Victor Newman, a powerful business tycoon with a penchant for being a ruthless tyrant, both in business and in his personal life.

But what really got me hooked was the parade of handsome hunks featured on the show throughout the ’90s. I secretly salivated over a shirtless Nick Newman, one of my first boy crushes. Joshua Morrow, the actor who plays the character to this day, still gives me zaddy vibes.

I’ve watched Y&R almost religiously ever since, and was tickled pink recently to see fan-favourite couple Mariah and Tessa tie the knot in the show’s first-ever same-sex wedding. Portrayed

by Camryn Grimes (who came out as bisexual in 2020) and Cait Fairbanks, the characters have been paired up on the show since 2017. Their marriage marks a milestone moment for the longrunning soap, and signals a step in the right direction towards inclusion and representation.

“Our relationship has been incredibly supported by the fans so far, and that’s what makes this such a joy,” shared Grimes in an interview with People. “We feel like we get to give this gift back to them, and they get to watch our characters just be happy and in love, and it’s a huge culmination of their relationship’s journey.”

LGBTQ2+ representation is not only making strides in daytime television, but in prime-time TV, too.

GLAAD’s 2021-2022 Where We Are on TV report found that of the 775 series regular characters scheduled to appear on scripted broadcast prime-time programming, 92 characters (or 11.9 per cent) are LGBTQ2+, a 2.8 percentage point increase from the previous year and a new record high.

For the first time in the report’s history, lesbian characters make up the majority of LGBTQ2+ characters on broadcast shows, at 56 characters or 40 per cent, up six percentage points from the previous season; gay men represent 49 characters or 35 per cent, down five percentage points; bisexual representation comes in at 27 characters or 19 per cent, one percentage point higher than last year; and there are 42 transgender regular and recurring characters across all broadcast, cable and streaming, up 29 from last year.

Additionally, the study showed an increase in the racial diversity of LGBTQ2+ characters on broadcast and streaming, but a decrease on cable. At 58 per cent, LGBTQ2+ people of colour outweigh white LGBTQ2+ people on broadcast for the fourth year in a row.

Why does authentic LGBTQ2+ representation in media matter?

There’s a correlation between the way the world perceives and portrays us and how we perceive and portray ourselves. If we’re not accurately and fully represented in the shows we watch and the media we consume, it can make us feel invisible. For far too long, LGBTQ2+ folks were depicted in the media only in relation to trauma stories that reinforced negative stereotypes and failed to show our full humanity. The truth is, we exist in every story.

That’s why Mariah and Tessa’s made-for-TV wedding had such an impact on me.

Soap operas are often dismissed as pure fantasy or escapism, but at their core they’re all about families, relationships, sexcapades, emotional and moral conflicts, and navigating this thing called life. As a loyal fan of Y&R, I dreamed of the day when a same-sex storyline would take centre stage on the show and be celebrated.

When it finally happened, it made me feel seen.

Best wishes and warm regards to the happy couple.

JUMOL ROYES is IN Magazine’s director of communications and community engagement, a GTA-based storyteller and glass-half-full kinda guy. He writes about compassion, community, identity and belonging. His guilty pleasure is watching the Real Housewives. Follow him on Twitter at @Jumol and on Instagram at @jumolroyes.

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HERE’S WHAT ORDER TO READ THE BOOKS AND NOVELLAS

While you eagerly await Season 2 of this hit series, here’s our guide to the four Heartstopper graphic novels and novellas

By Christopher Turner

JULY / AUGUST 2022

By now you’ve probably already seen Netflix’s breakout hit series Heartstopper at least once. Based on British author Alice Oseman’s graphic novels of the same name, the heartwarming story follows Year 10 student Charlie (Joe Locke) as he falls for his Year 11 form seatmate, Nick Nelson (Kit Connor).

Netflix’s adaptation of the queer coming-of-age series launched on April 22 with eight 30-minute episodes, all based on Oseman’s beloved Tumblr web-comic-turned-graphic-novels. The show became an instant sensation around the world, ranking on the streaming platform’s top 10 list in an impressive 54 countries and becoming one of the few series to score the coveted and incredibly rare 100 per cent score on Rotten Tomatoes, with critics universally praising the show. Then, in a testament to the supremely joyful story checking all the boxes as a Netflix success story, the streamer made the rare move – less than a month after it debuted – of renewing Heartstopper for not one but two seasons.

There’s no official word yet on a release date for the second (or third) season, but if you’re looking to take your Heartstopper obsession to the next level or are looking for a little preview of what might be in store, you can dive into the source material.

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Oseman initially crowd-funded a limited self-published print run of the online comic in 2018, which reached its target in two hours.

This led to Hachette Children’s Group stepping in and acquiring the rights to publish the comic to the masses, with the first official volume of Heartstopper being published in the spring of 2019.

There are now four volumes of Heartstopper (as of July 2022), and the fifth and final volume of the series is expected to be released in early 2023. A companion book, titled Heartstopper Yearbook, is scheduled to drop on October 13, 2022. Then there are Oseman’s novellas, some of which feature the beloved Heartstopper characters.

Ready to get reading? Here’s our suggested reading order to get you into the swing of things.

Heartstopper: Volume 1 Netflix’s adaptation of Heartstopper is based on volumes one and two of Oseman’s bestselling graphic novel series, and this is where it all began. As the description reads, “Charlie and Nick are at the same school, but they’ve never met…until one day when they’re made to sit together. They quickly become friends, and soon Charlie is falling hard for Nick, even though he doesn’t think he has a chance. But love works in surprising ways, and Nick is

was praised for the way it handles Charlie’s mental health and eating disorder. It ends on a high note, and fans of the series are already desperate to see the hilarious and heartwarming “I love you” scene on the screen.

Heartstopper: Volume 2 Volume two picks up immediately after the kiss and continues with a classic case of misunderstood feelings and with Nick discovering more about himself. As the description reads, “Nick and Charlie are best friends, but one spontaneous kiss has changed everything.

In the aftermath, Charlie thinks that he’s made a horrible mistake and ruined his friendship with Nick, but Nick is more confused than ever. Love works in surprising ways, and Nick comes to see the world from a new perspective.” The graphic novel covers off episodes 4 through 9 of the Netflix series and ends pretty much the same way the Netflix series ends, with Nick coming out as bisexual to his mother.

Solitaire Solitaire, Oseman’s debut novel (she wrote it at age 17!), features some of the same characters as Heartstopper and operates within a similar timeline, but they are very different stories. Heartstopper is a happy, romantic, uplifting graphic novel series that focuses on Nick and Charlie, while Solitaire is a dark story about mental illness that follows Tori Spring, Charlie’s older sister. It was published in 2014, long before Heartstopper was. It is technically the first to introduce the characters of Nick and Charlie (who appear periodically throughout the novel), but chronologically, it starts a year after Heartstopper Volume 1, while Charlie is struggling with his eating disorder. Solitaire follows the story of pessimistic teenager Tori, who meets Michael, her polar opposite: an unbelievable optimist.

They attempt to find out who is behind the pranks at their school, which get more serious as the novel progresses.

Heartstopper: Volume 3 Volume three kicks off the not-yet-Netflix-adapted part of Nick and Charlie’s story; we get to see the couple establish their relationship as boyfriends during the Year 10/11 school trip to Paris. We also see Charlie tell his family about Nick, meet David (Nick’s older brother) and begin to really explore Charlie’s anxiety and selfimage issues, and the ways in which these negatively impact his relationship with eating. The description reads, “[C]oming out isn’t something that happens just once, and Nick and Charlie try to figure out when to tell their friends that they’re dating. Not being out to their classmates gets even harder during a school trip to Paris. As Nick and Charlie’s feelings get more serious, they’ll need each other more than ever.”

Heartstopper: Volume 4 In the penultimate book in the series, Charlie and Nick face a new school year together, and new struggles. Per the description, “Charlie and Nick’s relationship has been going really well, and Charlie thinks he’s ready to say those three little words: I love you. Nick feels the same way, but he’s got a lot on his mind – especially the thought of coming out to his dad and the fact that Charlie might have an eating disorder.” This book in particular

Nick and Charlie Nick and Charlie (2015) and This Winter (2015) are spin-off novellas from Solitaire and Heartstopper, but both can still be enjoyed even if you haven’t read those books. (Both were published

by Harper Collins Children’s Books.) Nick and Charlie offers up a little pre-uni drama and catches up with the couple more than two years into their relationship. The novella takes place as Nick is getting ready to graduate Year 13 and preparing to head off to university. Charlie, who is a year younger, struggles with the thought of being left behind.

This Winter This Winter offers up a little Christmas cuteness. The novella deals mostly with Charlie’s eating disorder and how his family is coping with it. It is divided into three sections: one for each Spring sibling (Tori and Charlie have a younger brother, seven-year-old Oliver, who is not featured in the Netflix series). Charlie’s section is, naturally, more focused on his relationship with Nick.

STILL NEED MORE FROM THE OSEMAN UNIVERSE? Check out Radio Silence, a novel that follows the story of Aled Last from the Heartstopper graphic novels. If you haven’t read those novels, you may be a little confused about where the character of Aled comes from. Aled is one of the only characters from the graphic novels who does not appear in the Heartstopper Netflix adaptation. Back in January 2021, Oseman shared on Twitter that this omission had to do with his significant storyline in Radio Silence. “I decided not to include Aled in the TV series. I know this will disappoint some of you, and I’m so sorry for that, but I did not feel I could give Aled a truly satisfying, complex storyline in the show while having to totally ignore the events of Radio Silence…

To include Aled in the Heartstopper show and give him a

satisfying storyline would almost certainly involve having to change and/or ignore major elements of the story of Radio Silence, which is not what I or any of you want, I hope!” This presents Netflix with the opportunity to adapt Radio Silence, a novel in which Aled is one of the main protagonists, and his identity and relationships are explored.

Next you could check out Oseman’s third YA novel, I Was Born for This (2018), which takes place two years after the conclusion of the events in Radio Silence. Finally, Loveless (2020) is a YA novel based on the life experiences of the author, who uses she/they pronouns and identifies as aromantic and asexual, and her own experiences in university.

CHRISTOPHER TURNER acted as guest editor for this issue of IN Magazine. He is a Toronto-based writer, editor and lifelong fashionisto with a passion for pop culture and sneakers. Follow him on social media at @Turnstylin.

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more interested in Charlie than either of them realized.” While there are some differences, the first volume essentially covers off the first three episodes of the Netflix series, ending after Nick and Charlie kiss at Harry’s birthday party.

COVER

WHAT IT’S LIKE TO BE A BLACK QUEER REFUGEE IN UKRAINE

Ukraine has been a safe haven for many foreign nationals. But now what?

By Adam Zivo Photo by Rostyslav Savchyn on Unsplash

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been terrifying for Ukrainians, with six million fleeing to other countries in Europe and around the world. But the story of foreign nationals – including students and people from other countries who were living in the country when Russia attacked – has been more complicated. International media reported that African residents who tried to escape the fighting were turned away at the borders and at train stations in Ukraine, although some racialized refugees have said that media reports of racism were overblown.

JULY / AUGUST 2022

Ukraine has been a safe haven for many foreign nationals. Some have stayed in the country because they do not want to return to the countries where they were born, and fear they may not be accepted in other countries. Others have decided to stay because they enjoy Ukrainian life, with some having married locals and started families in the country.

Most foreigners have left as a result of the war – for example, over 85 per cent of Ukraine’s Indian nationals have been evacuated from the country. In cities where it was once commonplace to bump into Africans, few can now be spotted. The foreign nationals who remain are rare stragglers.

Now imagine being LGBTQ+ while facing these challenges.

I sat down to talk with two gay Nigerian men in Ukraine, John and Valentine. John is a soft-spoken, though talkative, introvert who keenly follows international politics and takes a calm and

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level-headed approach to political conflict. He prefers playing board games with his friends rather than going to local technoclubs. Valentine is similarly introverted – an easy-going giant of a man who often pauses before he speaks and is careful with his words. He is less political and prefers to focus on work, urged by a strong sense of duty to those around him.

The two of them – one out from a young age, one not out at all – did not know each other until they were introduced during the research phase of this article (aka: we all grabbed drinks together), but their stories are nonetheless very similar. Both are in their late 20s and had come to Ukraine as students, and while they had initially been motivated to stay in Ukraine mostly because they did not want to return to Nigeria, over time they came to love the country. Both of them came from religious families where homosexuality was not accepted, and neither of them attended church anymore.

To protect their privacy, Valentine asked that only his first name be used and John asked to use a pseudonym. Both requested that potentially identifying details about their professional and student lives be kept private.

How Ukraine got an African diaspora Before the Russian invasion, Ukraine had a large international student population – local universities are very affordable and Ukrainian degrees can provide a gateway to jobs in the European Union. As a result, there were many Africans in Ukraine’s major cities. For that same reason, there were other minority communities,

Many of these international students studied in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city with a population of almost 1.5 million people, which has a large number of universities and a reputation for research, particularly in medicine and science. The universities helped create an African community – John said that it was impossible to walk through Kharkiv without bumping into a fellow African.

Valentine, who studied medicine but no longer works in health care, disagreed and said that it was possible to go a week without seeing Africans in Kharkiv, so long as one avoided the university area. He hadn’t studied in Kharkiv, though, and had completed his medical degree in Lviv; he said that Lviv’s African community was smaller but more closely knit.

transformation to the 2014 Euromaidan Revolution, where Ukrainians overthrew a corrupt pro-Russian government and warmed to more European values. Endeavouring to show that Ukraine’s future was European, not Russian, Ukrainians made an effort to be more tolerant of minority groups.

Of course, racism still exists, but Valentine said it depends on the crowd and it is “not the prevailing culture in Ukraine, especially among the young people.” John agreed that racism was contextsensitive and, although he didn’t think he would be attacked in Kyiv or Lviv, he still kept pepper spray with him. His primary experiences of racism from Ukrainians tended to be from drunk ones, the exception being one time, many years ago, when he was threatened with a knife in a public place by a skinhead.

Though the experience was traumatic, John was more disappointed by the bystanders who did not intervene. Only twice during his time in Ukraine have locals stepped in to protect him from harassment.

Both times, his allies were old women who worked in nearby kiosks, and who came to his aid armed with sticks, shouting, “Leave him alone! Get away from him!”

Local Africans were often brought together through religious worship. “There are a lot of churches in Kharkiv,” said John.

“When I came here first, I met some people and pretty much the first thing they did was take me to their church. We’re religious in Nigeria, so it’s kind of the first thing your parents tell you as When asked about rumours that Ukraine was rife with Nazis well – to find a church and go to God. No matter what you do, no and fascists, both Valentine and John said that this was not their matter how you spend your Saturday or Sunday, you kind of find recent experience, due to Ukraine’s ongoing social liberalization. yourself in church.”

“I wouldn’t say it’s a thing that has come up very often in the past eight years. Before 2014, Ukraine was a totally different country.

National and regional distinctions, of course, matter in Africa, Before that time I would have answered yes,” said John. as they do all over the world. But in Ukraine these regional differences were erased – Ukrainians saw all Africans as simply Love and belonging “Black,” and so African nationals constructed their communities As a gay Nigerian, John believes he cannot be open about his around that lens, too. sexuality in any aspect of his life. When he told his mother he was an atheist, it broke her heart. She still cries frequently about “I guess it’s not a secret that there are a lot of Africans around the it. With just atheism being such a point of tension, he imagines world – we have to find this thing in common: we are all Black,” coming out to be simply impossible. Though John believes his said John. “As far as we know, people do not see the difference mother is a great person, he worries that she will blame herself between all of us and we shouldn’t see that difference.” for his homosexuality and “spend her time praying and crying and hoping for me to find my way back.”

However, national identities can still matter. “We Nigerians are the loudest,” laughed Valentine, who noted that all 12 of his African Because the African diaspora tends to know each other through classmates in his year were Nigerians like himself. Meanwhile, church attendance, and also through schooling, it has been difficult the Nigerian Student Association at his university had about 250 for John to live comfortably as a closeted gay man. Everyone members. “We had this small group of Nigerians who were just knows everyone. If any community member found out about his constantly annoying most of the time. That’s why it was different orientation, eventually everyone would. “It’s just difficult to have for me – to feel that Nigerians were kind of separate. I was kind a double life in a city like Kharkiv,” he said. of surrounded by them all the time. But for most people, it was like – oh, we’re Africans.”

In his early years in the Ukraine, John was unhappy not only with the claustrophobia of the African community, but with the chasm John and Valentine both noted that Ukraine had become significantly between foreigners and Ukrainians. Though Kharkiv’s foreigner less racist over the past decade. When they first arrived, the country population was large, non-nationals tend to keep to themselves. was culturally “closed” to foreigners, but attitudes have changed The international students often ghettoized themselves among as Ukrainians became increasingly exposed to other ethnicities. university peers, reducing opportunities for making intercultural “Now we have a lot of Africans working with young people, a connections. lot of integration, a lot of interracial relationships, and we have foreigners mingling with Ukrainians,” said Valentine. “They get When John moved to Kyiv several years ago, everything was to understand that these guys are cool.” different, he told me. There was more anonymity, openness and freedom, which made it easier to be gay. Though the city had a Simultaneously, Ukraine had become much more accepting of smaller proportion of foreigners, fewer of them were students LGBTQ+ people. John and Valentine partially attributed this and they were more integrated into society. “Everyone has been

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too – for example, there were approximately 20,000 Indians in Ukraine before the war, of which about 90 per cent were students.

But these communities have now almost entirely disappeared.

COVER

really nice and accepting. In my years of living in Kyiv, I’ve experienced two hostile people. And it hasn’t been really bad.

Just a drunk person and some grandfather who was unhappy with me speaking Russian.”

However, he found it difficult to mix with the local queer community.

Kyiv has a booming techno scene and the city has been described by local hipsters as “the new Berlin.” But John, an introvert, prefers quieter nights playing board games and wasn’t attracted to queer techno culture.

painful going through all of that alone. Hearing the explosions around. It was pretty hard.”

Most of Ukraine’s Africans left immediately, typically in groups, some of which were arranged by local churches. International churches were a lifeline, providing them with shelter and aid.

After the sixth day of bombing, Valentine began to feel as if he was the last African left in Kharkiv. He eventually left by train for Lviv with some of his Ukrainian colleagues.

The trip was unexpectedly reminiscent of Nigeria for Valentine.

His dating life was also hampered by sexual racism. “Even if “Travelling in Nigeria is sometimes not safe. Most people are afraid this place is becoming very open to queer people, it is not very when they’re about to go on a journey, so they pray before they open to queer people of colour,” John said. Ukrainians saw him go. It’s not something that we do in Ukraine because it’s typically primarily as an exotic sexual experience, rather than a person. safe. But I literally had to say a prayer – it wasn’t for the train “I’m not against sex. It’s fine for people to meet people to have trip, it was to get from my house to the train station,” he said. sex. It’s not a problem. The problem is when you’re simply this exotic experience, when people say, ‘I’ve never tried a Black As he departed for the station, he thought to himself, “Oh my guy.’ People still do that and that is extremely…just offensive. God, I can’t just die on the street like that. Nobody is going to I’m still just a thing.” find me.” The train trip, which typically takes 10 hours, took 30.

Valentine had a slightly different experience with his queerness.

He came out to his mom when he was 14 and informed her, at the same time, that he had been having sexual experiences at boarding school with another classmate since he was 10. This information shocked her, not necessarily because of the homosexuality, but because sex itself was taboo in the family. She ended up in the hospital. “That’s a story I don’t want to get into yet,” Valentine said, chuckling.

Her attitudes have not changed over time. “Oh no, no, no. She probably thought it was a phase that would pass. She didn’t talk about it, and [since I’ve been away at] boarding school and Ukraine, we haven’t really spent much time in the same house to have this conversation.”

Valentine left the church. Several years ago, he had an identity crisis. After some self-evaluation, he concluded that he was living according to other people’s definition of his life rather than his own.

JULY / AUGUST 2022

And then the bombings began All these intrigues about dating and identity, this search for community and belonging, was, like so much else, brutally interrupted by the war. No more romance. No more board games.

Just a race to get away from the bombs showering Kharkiv and Kyiv and much of the rest of the country. Any thoughts about sexual orientation “went out the window,” said Valentine, as everyone simply became individuals fleeing the war.

Several days after Valentine left Kharkiv, his apartment building was bombed, though his unit was not directly hit.

John made a similar journey to Lviv. At train stations, a womenand-children-first policy saw some Black men denied boarding, but he said that was likely because they were men, not because they were Black. Not having crossed the border, he couldn’t speak to stories that border guards prevented African people, but not white Ukrainians, from leaving the country.

He was concerned that an international fixation on racism had pitted foreigners against Ukrainians, and might invite hostility against foreigners like himself who decided to stay in the country.

“It was blown out of proportion, definitely. There were some cases, but it was not that bad,” he said.

Valentine agreed. “I noted at the beginning that there were a lot of videos about the treatment of Africans at the border, but I really haven’t experienced any of that. Ukrainians have been wonderful.”

On the train ride, Valentine noticed that passengers organized themselves amid the overcrowded chaos. Midway through the trip, there was an announcement that children in another wagon were hungry and had no food to eat. Passengers from other cars sent so much food that another announcement had to be made politely asking them to stop.

At first, Valentine thought he could wait out the bombings alone in his apartment. He had a remote job and tried to focus on getting work done, but it was impossible. He’d hear an explosion and see debris fly close to his window, and so relocated to another part of his apartment.

“They weren’t thinking about themselves; they were thinking about the collective. I have this moment I remember: I saw this father crying, just to get his kid on the train,” said Valentine. “The man wasn’t interested in getting on the train himself. He just wanted to get his kid on. He was shouting. He was screaming, crying.

Parents go through a lot.”

“I would get phone calls from Nigeria almost all the time and every single time I got a call, I had to pretend to be strong and pretend to be okay, because if I panic, then they panic, and if they panic, then it’s not so great,” said Valentine. “It was hard. It was

The future When Valentine arrived in Lviv, he did not know what to do with himself. The city was largely peaceful and insulated from the conflict in the east, but no one knew what was going to happen

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He was haunted by the thought of those left behind, and could not bear to go out to local cafés and restaurants despite government urgings to continue eating out to stimulate the economy. As we sat together at the bar, he said that what he felt was most likely survivor’s guilt.

class family, but he says that such families do not exist anymore: everyone is either incredibly rich or incredibly poor. At one point, his mother, who works for the government, wasn’t paid for five months. John out-earns her, but she has to provide for an entire family back home. He occasionally provides financial support for medication and emergency needs.

“Sure, there’s war in Ukraine, but there is electricity 24 hours a day. At some point, my parents didn’t have electricity for a month.

They were spending so much money on food because they couldn’t refrigerate anything. A couple of weeks ago there were two train attacks, terrorist attacks. My sisters live in Nigeria and they’re not safe. They have to take cars everywhere. The quality of life is so bad. You love the country. You love the people and the culture.

But the people in charge make it unlivable,” John said.

Valentine is not planning to return to Nigeria either. “Leave Ukraine? To what? I can go back to Nigeria, but I haven’t really interacted with the people there in almost 11 years. The last time I went to Nigeria was almost seven years ago. Besides my family members, every other person would be strangers. It would be going back to a life I don’t know. The people I know and have worked with are in Ukraine.”

He did not want to “roam about Europe like a refugee” and said he would only leave Ukraine if he had a clear plan for his future.

Leaving the country would also be like betraying his colleagues, who are barred from fleeing because they are Ukrainian men. A fellow African fled to Hungary a few days into the war, but, for Valentine, abandoning ship simply did not feel right.

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

One colleague of his, who was back in Kharkiv, had disappeared for two weeks. For those two weeks, no one was sure if the man was dead or alive. Eventually they learned that he had been in a bunker and hadn’t been able to charge his phone. Meanwhile, a man who Valentine had been flirting with online simply disappeared. “I’ve sent him a lot of messages on Telegram. It’s not going through. It says that he was last online months ago. Knowing that someone might be dead, knowing that people are suffering, makes it hard.”

One of John’s biggest problems was his new landlord, an old woman who charged him inflated rent for a rundown apartment with poor heating. As so many people in Kyiv had fled to Lviv, landlords had no shortage of prospective renters and occasionally tried to take advantage of them. Even though John had arrived in Lviv early in the war, he was not spared price gouging.

Even through the difficulty of war, John sees the country as his home, and he has come to love Ukrainian culture, especially since the 2014 pro-European revolution. Returning to Nigeria is not an option. “My Nigerian friends don’t like me saying this, but it’s pretty bad right now. It’s really bad right now, in Nigeria.”

Though Nigeria’s economy has grown rapidly over the past 20 years, income inequality has soared and national wealth has been monopolized by a tiny elite. John grew up in an upper-middle

While going back to Nigeria is not appealing, neither is fleeing to neighbouring countries, where support for refugees is essentially limited to Ukrainian refugees. Little thought was given to foreigners who had made a life in Ukraine but did not have Ukrainian citizenship. Many of these exiles now find themselves in a precarious limbo, floating around Eastern Europe on shortterm visas. Some are in refugee camps, others are in churches.

For Africans who had made an attempt to settle down in Ukraine and start a new life there, the tragedy of war runs deeper. “Some of them have families that are Ukrainian. Some of them are married.

Africans came and married Ukrainians and started raising their families here,” said John.

After we departed from the bar, John and Valentine chatted on the way home. John messaged me afterwards and said he was happy that the two of them had met. It made him feel less crazy for staying in Ukraine.

They had come to this country simply looking for education, and they had found, against their expectations, a home for themselves.

Ukraine was where they had spent their 20s and had come into themselves as gay men, despite occasional problems with prejudice.

They had watched the country grow more cosmopolitan with each year, to the point where the society they found themselves in could hardly be recognized as the one they had arrived to. After a decade in Ukraine, they did not want to leave. Not unless it was on their own terms.

ADAM ZIVO is IN Magazine’s politics and culture columnist. He is a Toronto-based social entrepreneur, photographer and analyst best known for founding the LoveisLoveisLove campaign.

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next. He did not know how to settle down. Should he buy only temporary items? Should he prepare for a longer stay?

COMMUNITY

“Out” As In…What Exactly?

As is to be expected for a community represented by a rainbow flag, things aren’t exactly black and white

By Jesse Boland

JULY / AUGUST 2022

Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash

Take a minute and ask yourself, What does a person have to do to become considered “out”? Is it a quantitative matter, where a certain number of people need to know that this person is queer; or is it more a qualitative matter, where it’s more significant as to who in that person’s life is aware of their queerness?

relationship, is he being dishonest? When considering the visual analogy of the magical closet of sexual identity, where people hide before being ready to announce their truth to the world, just how much of yourself do you need to bring out of the closet before you are officially considered “out”?

By the logic of those two arguments, would a kid be considered out if his entire school and friend group knows he’s gay but his parents don’t? If a happily married lesbian keeps her personal and work life separate by not discussing her wife or even sexuality in the office, is she considered closeted? When a trans woman successfully “passes” and allows people in her new life to assume she is cisgender without correcting them, has she in a sense abandoned her queerness? If a bisexual man is in a monogamous relationship with a woman and does not inform his girlfriend about his sexual orientation because he finds it irrelevant to the

The importance of outness is less a matter of positive representation and more an issue of safety and security. To be out is to declare that you are aware of the risks entailed with the public knowing your truth, and are willing to accept that burden. Moreover, being clear about your outness is important so others are aware of your standing and know if it is safe to discuss details about you without potentially outing you by accident. Tedious as it may be for queer people, it is partially our responsibility to be upfront about how we wish others to address us; you can’t be mad at someone for sharing your secret if you never told them it was a secret.

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Coming out is not a once-in-a-lifetime event, but rather an ongoing ritual we must perform every time we are introduced to someone new. While it does get easier over time, there are days when it can be just as exhausting and draining as the first time. It is often for this reason that many people in more recent years, particularly in Hollywood, have elected to (sorta) come out by refusing to publicly label their sexuality and instead seeking comfort in the solace of ambiguity. While it may be in vogue to be vague for the more privileged individuals, these murky waters of unclear sexual identity can be treacherous for the rest of us.

For example, former One Direction member and currently annoying person Harry Styles has been the subject of public fascination for years for his questionable queerness, which to this day he has not publicly confirmed or denied. His refusal to address such a personal matter simply to slake the general public’s bloodthirsty curiosity – the same intrusion of privacy that harpooned the careers of fellow pop stars of earlier years such as Ricky Martin and Clay Aiken – was at first considered admirable, as it drew a line between what subjects of the public eye were expected to share with the world and what they were allowed to protect. He lost me, however, when he allowed the is he or isn’t he? component of his public image to become an integral part of his brand, to the extent of dropping videos of himself writhing around shirtless on National Coming Out Day and playing the lead role in a gay romantic drama. Conversations about gaybaiting and the authenticity of gay actors playing gay roles has been done to death – and, frankly, done better by smarter writers than I – but an issue that does not get addressed enough is the sense of authority that possibly queer celebrities feel entitled to when speaking on queer issues.

Styles was recently quoted in Better Homes and Garden magazine (for some reason) saying, “The whole point of where we should be heading, which is toward accepting everybody is being more open, is that it doesn’t matter, and it’s not about having to label everything, not having to clarify what boxes you’re checking.”

Without even addressing his words themselves, it cannot be overstated that if he is not in fact queer, how fucked up is it for a potentially straight man to be telling a community of people that our identities are irrelevant and unimportant? This rhetoric of labelling sexualities as being an outdated and unnecessary concept is part of a pernicious influx of rainbow blindness negating the very real systemic violence facing the LGBTQ+ community.

To deny the importance of visible queerness is to dismiss the very real adversities we face for living true in our flesh. As young people around the world are watching more and more transphobic and Don’t Say Gay bills brutalize queer children across the US and

beyond, it seems a perplexing stance to take that standing true in the proudness of our genders and sexualities is inconsequential to our survival. Furthermore, it is trivializing to pretend that identifying as anything other than cishet does not come with fatal consequences for many people.

Though the metaphorical closet may feel like a prison for many, for others it is a needed shelter to protect themselves from the hateful violence awaiting them if they dare to step out too soon.

Without labels, there would be no statistics on homeless LGBTQ+ youth, and ignoring the stem of this epidemic would allow the pattern to continue without progress. Netflix may be telling kids that it’s okay to be brave and true to themselves because people will love them no matter what, yet growing numbers of trans women being murdered and news reports of gay kids being bullied to death say otherwise.

It was this maelstrom of bigotry that six years ago prompted one of the most unusual headlines to come out of 2016: a celebrity coming out as straight. In a career mirroring that of Harry Styles, actor Jack Falahee (best known for playing the openly gay character of Connor Walsh on How to Get Away With Murder) had, like Styles, avoided the topic of his sexual orientation, calling all the speculation about his sexuality “reductive.” However, following the presidential victory of Donald Trump, he felt compelled to come forward about his heterosexuality, after realizing he could not share in the same level of consternation that the LGBTQ+ community felt. “Ultimately,” he said, “I think that my stance has been unhelpful in the fight for equality. I feel that I’ve sacrificed my ability to support the community for a more theoretical discussion about sexuality.”

For an actor who at the time had been receiving positive press for his unclear sexual orientation (his “reductive” quote was from a profile piece for Out magazine, for whom he was the cover star), this decision to publicly acknowledge his truth in being unable to fully grasp the pain and dread of others because of his privilege felt oddly refreshing. Sometimes the greatest empathy allies can offer is the recognition that they will never know our pain. Your move, Harold.

We are left with a rather ambivalent space with not a lot of concrete answers. While it is more vital than ever for queer people to show up and be true in our identities for the sake of maintaining our presence in a world devoted to erasing us, it is also necessary for many of us to continue hiding until the world is safe enough to embrace us.

If you take one thing away from this discussion, may it be that there is absolutely no shame about someone being in the closet.

For many, the closet may be less of a prison and more of a womb that protects and nourishes individuals before they are ready for their grand entrance into our community. If the music of SZA has taught us anything, it’s that it’s okay to lie, especially when it means protecting your own peace, as your truth is a luxury that others do not deserve. And if and when you do come out, may you be able to take pride in whatever letter of our alphabet you feel best represents you, even if it changes from time to time, without feeling as though it limits the individual you are. You have spent too long living in a closet to be trapped again in another box.

JESSE BOLAND is that gay kid in class who your English teacher always believed in. He’s a graduate of English at Ryerson University (now Toronto Metropolitan University) who has a passion for giving a voice to people who don’t have data on their phones and who chases his dreams by foot because he never got his driver’s licence.

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As someone who failed miserably at hiding my sexuality in my early years of high school (I describe my younger self as being in the closet but with the door wide open), it was anxiety inducing to walk the halls hearing kids I had never spoken to gossip behind my back about my undeclared sexuality. Yet later in life, when I had been living openly as gay for years, it was comical seeing my co-workers beat around the bush when referencing my sexuality for fear of insulting me; to this day, the most brilliant way anyone ever called me a faggot was when my friend Janet referred to me as a “member of the community,” and I adore her for it.

Photo by Jiroe (Matia Rengel) on Unsplash

MOVIES

RETHINKING THE R O M A N T I C C O M E DY Let’s keep pushing what the romantic comedy can look like

By Jaime Woo

JULY / AUGUST 2022

Photo by Jamie Street on Unsplash

The allure of romantic comedies lies, in part, with the unimpeachable quality of love between the protagonists. Whether or not they are together at the end of the film is trivial, for the audience is left satisfied as long as they have fought hard for it. Their job is to have valiantly defended the idea of love that is seemingly predestined but also must be earned.

Often, to do so is to fight the societal pressures of the day, whether they be the obstacles around the conventions of class, gender,

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race or sexuality. In too many romantic comedies, the obstacle is that one of the protagonists is already in a relationship, and is expected to stay just because. While the act of shedding convention has its merits as a chance to learn about oneself, the filmmakers often stack the deck so heavily for the leading stars, and make the existing partner such a pill, that it hardly seems a sacrifice to let them go. Audiences appear comforted with the safety of being affirmed that who we end up with – that true love – is ordained in some way, compelled by some otherworldly power. If we just

Mindy Kaling, herself a student of romantic comedies, has noted that these films can be viewed as a form of science fiction, and require a leap of faith to work. In her New Yorker piece, “Flick Chicks,” she writes:

I grew up loving this absurd but comforting quality of romantic comedies. I watched as Julia Roberts, Sandra Bullock and Reese Witherspoon fell in love again and again, somehow deeply sensing “I like watching people fall in love onscreen so much that I can that the crackling, irreverent dialogue was actually the hidden-in- suspend my disbelief in the contrived situations that occur only in plain-sight language of the queer scribes I’d eventually identify the heightened world of romantic comedies. I have come to enjoy with. I watched as these unusually clumsy but beautiful (and often the moment when the male lead, say, slips and falls right on top blonde) women broke free from their (sometimes self-imposed) of the expensive wedding cake. I actually feel robbed when the prisons to find true love. female lead’s dress doesn’t get torn open at a baseball game while the JumboTron camera is on her. I regard romantic comedies as Like watching the underdog somehow triumph over a corrupt a subgenre of sci-fi, in which the world operates according to system, or witnessing the Final Girl escape death from a nearly- different rules than my regular human world. For me, there is no omnipotent killer, watching two beautiful people recognize their difference between Ripley from ‘Alien’ and any Katherine Heigl love for one another despite the odds brought a wonderful escapism. character. They are equally implausible.”

So much so that I followed the genre well into my 20s and 30s, having related with house bunnies and jumping the broom, and Romantic comedies as a subgenre of science fiction: I like that bravely followed the women of Sex and the City onto the silver idea for another reason. In science fiction, we imagine possibilities screen with rapidly-decaying, diminishing gains. beyond what we have in the now. We love Star Trek because it imagines a more progressive future…with Holodecks! The new In the late Aughts, and for about a decade after that, the romantic series Tom Swift features the first Black queer male lead on network comedy landscape was dire for the genre’s admirers. A string of television, and he’s a stylish tech genius to boot! So with this new unwatchable Katherine Heigl romantic comedies – where no one crop of romantic comedies, we imagine a world where falling in appeared to be having any fun – had the effect of photocopying love is just done by people – any people, all people. a photocopy until there was but the fuzzy image of what was not worth copying in the first place. The films would become so cliché I’m used to imagining myself in other people besides myself. What’s that Rebel Wilson starred in a Scream-like parody of romantic beautiful is that this is a chance for other people to practise that. comedies called Isn’t It Romantic.

We humans have a great imagination. We can imagine ourselves on Mars. We can imagine other times and other places. So, it’s But if the genre had been left for all but dead, there has been nice to see ourselves reflected on the big screen, but to feel like we somewhat of a renaissance. Crazy Rich Asians was one of the best actually need films to reflect our own reality is, in a way, to blunt romantic comedies in years. For a slightly younger audience, there that – to say it only works when we see ourselves on the screen. was To All The Boys I Loved Before. Kumail Nanjiani fictionalized his real-life love story in The Big Sick. A wave of queer rom-coms I still (and will probably always) love a great romantic comedy, have included Joel Kim Booster’s Fire Island and the Christmas- because the genre is one of the few that rewards vulnerability. Sure, themed Single All The Way. I wish it didn’t equate performing self-work in order to be worthy of meeting your partner, but even then I can quiet the cynicism if With these films (as well as Turning Red and Everything Everywhere the film properly captures the beauty of longing.

All At Once), much has been written about the importance of having Asian faces on the big screen. This is true, and for many people of To want for something is such a complex emotion. As author Susan Asian descent, it has been a long time coming to see themselves Cain has noted in her book Bittersweet: reflected on such a scale. Michelle Yeoh has given us two textured portraits of motherhood in Crazy Rich Asians and Everything “But longing is momentum in disguise: it’s active, not passive; Everywhere All At Once; watching her, and the Aunties in Turning touched with the creative, the tender, and the divine. We long for Red, I can’t believe I’m seeing on the big screen the kind of parental something, or someone. We reach for it, move toward it. The word figures I grew up with. longing derives from the Old English langian, meaning “to grow long,” and the German langen – to reach, to extend. The word And if this is your first experience seeing life through an Asian- yearning is linguistically associated with hunger and thirst, but American lens, then you’re welcome. Enjoy your stay. It’s a also desire. In Hebrew, it comes from the same root as the word fabulous place to be. for passion.”

A common thread runs through these films of the past half-decade: now that the gatekeepers have fled, it should be no surprise that the genre could be revived by outsiders. Now, we can have the story of a biracial Korean-American falling in love for the first time. We have space for a man of colour to fall in love, even queer men of colour (and with each other!).

That passion and thirst encapsulates so much of the human experience. And it should be the whole of the human experience.

Let’s keep pushing what the romantic comedy can look like. It’s a chance for other people to grow their imaginations, to practise and stretch their imagination, to see themselves in all shades and shapes of faces and bodies, and to understand that beneath those characters are very relatable, recognizable people.

JAIME WOO is a writer based in Toronto, focusing on the intersection of technology and culture. He’s best-known for his Lambda Literary-nominated book, Meet Grindr, dissecting how the design of the infamous app influences user behaviour.

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fight through enough of the world’s tests, the story goes, we’ll be rewarded with The One.

FASHION

UNCHAINED MELODY The new Fetish Collection from Addicted USA is sweet and soulful to men’s rears

By Mylo Whalen

As fashion and fetish-wear continue to become increasingly intertwined, designers are striving to incorporate the latter’s seedy aesthetic into their collections. The latest to combine ready-to-wear design sensibilities with kink wear is the gay-owned menswear designer Addicted USA. Earlier this year, the brand unveiled “Unchained,” the latest collection from AD Fetish, their steamy line that features crafted harnesses, singlets and jocks.

The collection draws inspiration from the gay bathhouse scene, yet everything in Unchained is finely and meticulously crafted by Addicted’s artisan team. “When you go into a sex store and shop fetish clothes, the first thing you notice is they’re not very wearable,” explains Addicted USA’s Chris Lynch. “The Unchained collection from AD Fetish makes clothing and accessories that look fetish-y but are comfortable and well built.”

Designer Carmen Monforte says her team had fun designing the Unchained collection. “It allowed us to go beyond the cotton, Lycra and mesh in our sports collections and work new materials – like rubber, leather and see-through fabrics – into the creations.”

She says the collection’s purpose goes beyond sex and seduction and is about embracing the male body in a way that compliments every body size. “The Unchained garments are sewn and tailored to fit perfectly on all body shapes.”

“The collection breaks the barrier that’s there when guys buy clothes – the one that says, ‘My stomach’s too big to wear this’ or ‘my legs are too skinny to wear that,’” adds Lynch. “We’re giving guys a new confidence: inspiring them to be secure in who they are, their bodies, and to not let anyone interfere with that.”

On the retail end, Lynch says the response for Unchained has been enthusiastic, with initial pieces selling out and guys Instagramming themselves in their favourite looks. The harnesses, in particular, have been fan favourites.

JULY / AUGUST 2022

Monforte is encouraged by the success and says she plans to use it as a springboard to take the line even further. “I want to take the collection beyond the niche. I want to reach guys who wouldn’t normally wear fetish gear. I want them to see kink wear as empowering.”

Lynch agrees. He believes collars, body chains and, of course, the sexy leather harnesses are must-have accessories for every man this season. “All men should be able to walk out the door and boldly proclaim, ‘Hey, this is me and I don’t give a fuck what anyone else thinks.’”

Visit AddictedUSA.com.

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FASHION Photos courtesy of AddictedUSA.com

MYLO WHALEN was born and raised in northern Virginia, and graduated from Parsons School of Design and New York University’s Summer Publishing Program in 2019. He now lives in New York City and works in fashion media.

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Love Song Love is in the air, everywhere we look around…

PHOTOGRAPHER: Ivan Otis PRODUCTION/WARDROBE STYLIST: Paul Langill WARDROBE STYLIST: Mike Gosio HAIR: Brian Phillips for World Salon using World Hair Skin and La Biosthetique MAKEUP: Gelareh Kamazani POST PRODUCTION: Olivia Burwell COUPLES: Salem Azizah and Anthony Adema; Ruby Woodhams and Logan Facoetti; Carter Roy and Kahvontay Willis-Slaughter; Zahra Siddiqui and Lee Hamilton; Seth Erik Falk and Travis Frank L’Henaff

JULY / AUGUST 2022

Studio services supplied by @studio311.ca

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TALES OF LOVE

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TALES OF LOVE JULY / AUGUST 2022

YOUR FULL NAMES, ANY NICKNAMES? Salem Azizah (Habbi) and Anthony Adema (Anferney).

HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN TOGETHER? 4.5 years in an open relationship.

WHERE ARE YOU BOTH FROM AND YOUR FAMILY BACKGROUNDS? Salem is from Syria and came to Canada in 2017; he is currently trying to bring his family to Canada. Anthony is from Holland Landing, Ontario.

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TALES OF LOVE

WHERE DO YOU CURRENTLY LIVE? We currently live near Church and Wellesley. So gay!

YOUR CURRENT PROFESSIONS? Anthony works in healthcare assessments and Salem works as a youth advisor for refugees and new Canadians. In our spare time, we host large parties and make safe spaces for the queer community.

WHAT’S SOMETHING YOU BOTH LOVE TO DO TOGETHER? KARAOKE!!! We are huge singing nerds and love to rent karaoke rooms.

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TALES OF LOVE YOUR FULL NAMES, ANY NICKNAMES? I’m Ruby Woodhams or Rue for short, and my partner’s name is Logan Facoetti.

HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN TOGETHER? We have been together for eight months and we’re still going strong.

WHERE ARE YOU BOTH FROM AND YOUR FAMILY BACKGROUNDS? We are both born and raised in Canada. Logan’s background is French and Italian, and mine is British and Norwegian.

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WHERE DO YOU CURRENTLY LIVE? I currently am living in Uxbridge, and Logan lives in Woodbridge.

YOUR CURRENT PROFESSIONS? We are both full-time models with part-time jobs.

WHAT’S SOMETHING YOU BOTH LOVE TO DO TOGETHER? We love going on adventures every week, and we have a Bob Ross painting night once a week.

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TALES OF LOVE

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TALES OF LOVE JULY / AUGUST 2022

YOUR FULL NAMES, ANY NICKNAMES? Our names are Carter Roy and Kahvontay Willis-Slaughter.

HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN TOGETHER? We have been in a relationship for almost three years!

WHERE ARE YOU BOTH FROM AND YOUR FAMILY BACKGROUNDS? Carter is Irish and indigenous; Kahvontay is American and Nova Scotian.

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TALES OF LOVE

WHERE DO YOU CURRENTLY LIVE? We currently live together in downtown Toronto.

YOUR CURRENT PROFESSIONS? Carter is a student studying journalism; Kahvontay is a professional dance artist and bartender at Woody’s, one of Toronto’s number one gay bars.

WHAT’S SOMETHING YOU BOTH LOVE TO DO TOGETHER? We love to cook and travel!

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TALES OF LOVE JULY / AUGUST 2022

YOUR FULL NAMES, ANY NICKNAMES? Zahra Siddiqui and Lee Hamilton.

HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN TOGETHER? We have been together for two and a half years and we are deeply in love!

WHERE ARE YOU BOTH FROM AND YOUR FAMILY BACKGROUNDS? I’m born and raised in Toronto, and my family immigrated to Canada from Pakistan in 1979; Lee moved to Canada in 2000, from Kingston, Jamaica.

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TALES OF LOVE

WHERE DO YOU CURRENTLY LIVE? We live in downtown Toronto!

YOUR CURRENT PROFESSIONS? I’m a curator and community engagement manager for Artscape Launchpad, and Lee is the programming and events manager for Pride Toronto.

WHAT’S SOMETHING YOU BOTH LOVE TO DO TOGETHER? We are foodies, so we definitely love exploring the restaurant scene in Toronto.

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TALES OF LOVE YOUR FULL NAMES, ANY NICKNAMES? Seth Erik Falk and Travis Frank L’Henaff, or Frankie.

HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN TOGETHER? We have been in each other’s lives since filming for Canada’s Drag Race Season 1, which started in November 2019, so 2.5 years. We are love partners in crime.

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WHERE ARE YOU BOTH FROM AND YOUR FAMILY BACKGROUNDS? Travis: I’m a small-town Queer BC boy raised by a single super mom. Seth: I’m transracially adopted and brought up in Cambridge, Ont., and in the past few years I’ve been reconnecting with my incredible birth mom.

WHERE DO YOU CURRENTLY LIVE? We both live in downtown Toronto.

YOUR CURRENT PROFESSIONS? Seth: Animal wrangler advocate, zoo owner and model. Travis: Model, influencer, creative.

WHAT’S SOMETHING YOU BOTH LOVE TO DO TOGETHER? We love going on adventures, and what I find particularly special is the amount of time we get to spend on set and creating together.

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TALES OF LOVE

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INSIGHT

Black And Queer Histories Merge In Oluseye Ogunlesi’s Playful Universe An interview with the Nigerian-Canadian multidisciplinary artist based in Toronto

By Paul Gallant Photo by Josh Rille

“There are things I’m shy about, but no, I’m not shy,” the artist Oluseye Ogunlesi tells me. We’re on the phone while Ogunlesi is at a fabricator’s warehouse in Orangeville, Ont., where, a few minutes after our conversation, he’ll be using a flame-thrower to blacken the wooden frame of his latest artwork.

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I had mentioned to Ogunlesi that not only does he use himself as a model in many of his photographic works, but his Instagram feed is also a parade of gay handsomeness. But Ogunlesi, who certainly knows how to set a thirst trap, is far too savvy about his public image and his seriousness of purpose to dwell on compliments.

Instead, he talks about how playfulness is a major element of his artwork. It’s true – even when his art is wrestling with tough subjects like homophobia, racism or the history of slavery, there’s a brightness, friendliness and sense of fun that makes a viewer feel engaged rather than scolded.

Lake Ontario, in Ashbridges Bay Park, from June 9 until September 5, as part of Toronto’s Luminato international arts festival. The cathedral-like structure allows visitors to walk inside, perhaps imagining they’re in the hull of a ship bringing slaves from Africa to the Americas (27 slave ships were built in Canada). But visitors can enter “Black Ark” from one side or the other – it’s a two-way journey. So maybe the sculpture is also evocative of a ship that actually took approximately 1,200 Black people from Halifax, Nova Scotia, to Freetown, Sierra Leone, in 1792. That voyage was led by Thomas Peters, an 18th-century community leader and British Loyalist who organized the migration to Africa after the British broke their promises to Black people who had come to New Brunswick and Nova Scotia seeking a fresh start.

Ogunlesi’s interest in the various histories that have existed – and might have existed – for Black people in the Americas was sparked a few years ago when he visited North Preston, the community with the largest Black population in Nova Scotia.

“People want to be educated,” he tells me. “People do want change, but no one wants to feel like they’re being told what to do; no one wants to be made to feel guilty, like they’re not doing what’s right. “I am very interested in forgotten and neglected Black Canadian I think there’s a way in which you can get the message across in history because these are Canadian histories,” Ogunlesi says. “As a way that people have fun, even as you are inciting change. And a Black person, as someone who migrated here, it was necessary I think that’s what my work does.” for me to know what Black history had existed before my arrival here. In North Preston, I met Black communities that have been Born in England and raised in Lagos, Nigeria, Ogunlesi lived in there since the 1700s, and that’s when I advanced to another level London (England) and Montreal (he has a bachelor of commerce of my being Canadian.” from Montreal’s McGill University and a master’s of science in entrepreneurship from Bayes Business School, University His visit to North Preston affected not only his Canadianness of London) before moving to Toronto about a dozen years ago. and the subject matter he wanted to address, but his artistic form.

“When I moved back to Canada, as someone geared to the creative Though he started out mostly painting, after the North Preston visit world with so-so French, Toronto felt like the right place to he started using found objects in his work – objects that might move,” he says. be considered garbage, like antique farm implements and debris collected from the street, but that have their own beauty as well The wooden frame he was working on the day we spoke is the as their connection to the past. With “Black Ark,” he’s literally skeleton of his “Black Ark” project, which will sit on the shore of manufacturing a sculpture on a grand scale.

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“I was really affected by the passage of the bill. There were quite a few killings of gay men and lesbians. I felt helpless. I felt like I didn’t know what to do or what to say. But I was also privileged because even though I was in Nigeria at the time, I had been living in Toronto. So when I got back to Canada, I felt I had to make work about that. And maybe for the first time in six years, I started drawing and painting again,” he says.

Looking at Ogunlesi’s works from 2014 and 2015, you see a lot of talent. In a series of portraits, he uses acrylic, charcoal and pastel to depict the faces and bodies of mostly young Black men, the images broken up with a cubist geometry Marcel Duchamp would recognize. They’re captivating and urgent – they look great on T-shirts. But the scale and ambition that inform “Black Ark” and other recent works reveal an artist who has become more self-confident, more engaged with the profound. The

2020 work “Traces of ecstasy I” has some of the same fractured modernist style of those earlier portraits, but it’s a booty-focused self-portrait of Ogunlesi himself as a sexually ambiguous orisha (a deity connected to the Yoruba religion of West Africa). “I am depicting a reconciliation of my Blackness, my Yoruba heritage, my queerness, my masculinity and my femininity,” states a note on the work. “I am baring my soul while simultaneously flaunting all of the attributes of a physically and sexually liberated being. There are no binary distinctions here – all parts of my being are fluid.”

Now Ogunlesi’s use of his own body in his work – his not being shy – comes into better focus: the image of himself is what, in part, brings together the various strands of his experience. “I don’t think it’s possible to have an interest in my work that’s about sexuality without also being interested in my work as a Black artist, because they’re both one and the same,” he says. “Even some of my nude work which maybe on first glance might be speaking to sexuality is also speaking to issues of race.”

When I ask Ogunlesi what he’s working on post-“Black Ark,” he’s a little mysterious. His star is rising and he has options. He’ll admit to taking a trip to Jamaica as part of a project to trace the journey of a slave ship that was built in Newfoundland, sent to Liverpool to be outfitted, then sailed to present-day Nigeria, where it took hundreds of enslaved people to Montego Bay. The viewers who follow Ogunlesi on this journey help him reinvent it through art.

And because we can’t change the future without changing how we see the past, that’s an essential duty. A duty that Ogunlesi makes a pleasure.

The cathedral-like Black Ark art installation in Toronto. Photo by Cassandra Popescu PAUL GALLANT is a Toronto-based writer and editor who writes about travel, innovation, city building, social issues (particularly LGBT issues) and business for a variety of national and international publications. He’s done time as lead editor at the loop magazine in Vancouver as well as Xtra and fab in Toronto. His debut novel, Still More Stubborn Stars, published by Acorn Press, is out now.

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INSIGHT

Ogunlesi’s family wanted him to choose a profession that would provide him with a decent living – ergo, business school in London. But he considered himself an artist first and foremost, and the creative side of him hadn’t let go. Once he graduated, he gravitated towards arts-adjacent jobs, like in architectural PR and as a booking agent for photographers, hairstylists, gallerists. Then he was shaken by larger forces. In the early 2010s, the Nigerian government proposed the Same Sex Marriage (Prohibition) Act, which stirred up homophobic feeling in the country where Ogunlesi had grown up and still often visited. The act, passed in 2013 and signed into law in 2014, made Ogunlesi reconsider what he wanted to be doing with his life.

TRAVEL

Thailand Is Your New Sanctuary The country has lifted travel restrictions, and is once again ready to welcome the world to its lavish palaces and ancient ruins, breathtaking beaches and secret waterfalls

JULY / AUGUST 2022

By Doug Wallace

With historic formalities and modern luxury, Thailand is a picture postcard of colour and culture, a sensorial thrill in the middle of the Indochinese Peninsula. And now that the country is fully open and safe, travellers can visit without overly onerous testing requirements or restrictions. Not only that, but the Thai people continue to maintain a peaceful and accepting nature, one that welcomes travellers of all backgrounds, races and sexual expressions.

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Fittingly, the Thai government is planning to take its commitment to diversity and inclusion one step further by continuing to support a new Civil Partnership Bill, which would grant more equal rights to same-sex couples (legislation is planned before the end of 2022).

This will be a big step for Thailand – the first country in Southeast Asia to make such progress with regard to LGBTQ rights.

TRAVEL

An exciting and exotic new world awaits When you arrive, be prepared to show proof of either a certificate of COVID vaccination or a negative RT-PCR or professional ATK test result within 72 hours of travel. There will be random checks of foreign visitors; if you’re found to be unvaccinated or not fully vaccinated and you don’t have proof of a pre-arrival negative test, you will be required to undergo a professional ATK test at the point of entry. (Visit tatnews.org for the most up-to-date information.)

From your arrival, you’re off on an adventure like none other, one that will no doubt begin in Bangkok, a busy capital with an international vibe, winding canals and vibrant street life. The city will serve as your intro to proper Thai cuisine, delivering a true taste sensation from the street stalls to the fancy restaurants.

Buddhism continues to permeate all aspects of Thailand life – ornate temples and Buddha monuments will all be part of your itinerary.

The beaches are some of the world’s most famous, stretching down two coastlines supported by almost 1,500 islands. You can enjoy a myriad of water sports on those beaches, including scuba and snorkelling, kite-surfing and paddling, plus – of course – plenty of just lying on the golden sand.

Beyond the beach, Thailand’s prolific biodiversity serves up mountains and forest and coastline, all teeming with wildlife, offering multiple avenues for natural exploration and eco-adventure.

And in the north, the Golden Triangle delivers protected parkland, along with amazing waterfalls and wild elephants – not to be missed.

New hotels opening this year include The Standard Bangkok Mahanakon, which will be the brand’s flagship property in Asia, sure to draw hipsters from all over the world. In the north, the new Meliá Chiang Mai sports some of that city’s most incredible vistas – and its highest rooftop bar. And the Kimpton Kitalay Samui – Kimpton’s first foray into Southeast Asia – has its own secluded Ko Samui beach cove.

However you slice the tantalizing icing on the Thailand cake, you’re destined to have an authentic adventure, generating memories that will last a lifetime.

Enter for a chance to win a trip for 2: www.goway.com/gothaibefree Information for LGBTQ+ travellers to Thailand: www.GoThaiBeFree.com

DOUG WALLACE is the editor and publisher of travel resource and podcast TravelRight.Today.

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Princely In Prince Edward County The stellar and stately Merrill House leads a growing list of burgeoning boutique hotels in Ontario’s favourite weekend playground

JULY / AUGUST 2022

By Doug Wallace

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Bay of Quinte” includes contemporary art and artefacts, presented in collaboration with Mohawk feathersmith Rebecca Maracle.

Jordan Martin de Rosales sweeps his hand across the wooden foyer and up the ornate blue and gold stairwell of the refurbished Merrill House boutique hotel in Picton, Prince Edward County. As owner and creative director, he had a hand in every swatch and sculpture, fringe and frame.

Every picture tells a story To say that Merrill House is infused with personality would be an understatement. This personality is big, as is the booming voice.

“My method is about drawing on little bits of things to blend together.

I don’t want it to feel like a museum, though; I want it to feel like a home,” Jordan says. Every piece has a pedigree, the interior design wholly linked to the man himself.

Built in 1878, the rejuvenated heritage hideaway is now a kaleidoscope of colour, filled with a mix of antiques and contemporary furnishings and art, a glorious jumble of modern installations and Chinese artefacts, Persian rugs and pink velvet, paintings and pottery, lithographs and carvings. There’s a 70-million-year-old dinosaur fossil and a stuffed peacock for added intrigue. The result is a bold environment, almost dizzying, stretching throughout the 14 themed guest rooms and drawing rooms. It all comes from Jordan’s own art collection, creating a look he describes as eclectic traditionalism.

“I think beautiful things can live together, wherever they’re from and from whatever time period,” he says. “I’m always moving them around, adjusting everything by a few degrees.”

Permanent little exhibits dress up the upper floors. Along one hallway, “Life in Colour” presents a natural history display of birds, butterflies, insects and the above-mentioned dinosaur fossil.

In another, “1878” depicts the history of the prominent Merrill family and the news back in the day. “Indigenous Peoples on the

Originally from nearby Hastings County, Jordan worked in marketing and hospitality in London, Dubai and Africa before bringing his enthusiasm for art and interior design, history and wine to Picton in 2018. His husband is the artist Evert Rosales Gomez de Martin, whose illustrations grace some of the hotel’s marketing materials, including a Merrill family history comic book.

The total restoration was finished in 2019, complete with air conditioning and a state-of-the-art wine cellar. Rural outposts of the business include a lavender garden and kitchen gardens, plus a 100-year-old apple orchard, which has encouraged a traditional sparkling cider side project. The hotel produces its own bathroom amenities directly from the kitchen gardens, as well as candles and preserves. Oh, the jam! We eat almost a whole pot at breakfast, which is prepared by Chef Lili Sullivan, wife of Head Chef Michael Sullivan, who ran the Merrill’s previous kitchen in its former life.

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TRAVEL

“My soul is being poured out here. Ten years of collecting art and all sorts of things.”

TRAVEL

In the small but mighty restaurant on the lower floor, which now opens up to a new covered patio, Chef Sullivan serves elevated French food with a Burgundian flare. We opt for the sublime sixcourse tasting menu that harnesses the tastes of the County and enjoy wines curated by Astrid Young, who also directs an array of wine classes and popular monthly tastings.

Jordan’s newest side venture is planting his own vineyard of pinot noir at his home, Hydrangea House in nearby Cressy, with the help of South Bay’s Exultet Estates. It’s all part of the bigger picture, of course. “I love wine and art, so all my passions are coming together.

It’s an all-encompassing experience for me – and hopefully for our guests, too.”

Always looking forward to next time Prince Edward County has a way of working its way under your skin, so repeat visits are easy to schedule. Each time I visit – the wineries, the tidy patios, the roadside markets and quaint little shops – I always leave wanting more. And by the looks of my social feeds, many Ontarians feel the same way, particularly the carloads of LGBTQ folk. And now that jumping on the highways for a weekend away has become second nature, thanks in part this year to the provincial government’s staycation benefit program, the County roads will see quite a few cars this summer. This popularity has no doubt guided the path of numerous hospitality entrepreneurs, all trying to ensure there are enough beds to go around.

Picton’s brand-new Royal Hotel dates back to a similar time period as the Merrill, its 33 rooms catering to the fairly well-heeled youngat-hearts, with rooms revealing rich, natural colours and mixed textures. A library, swimming pool, private terrace and destination farm-to-table restaurant round out the offerings.

The ’70s retro refit at the sunny June Motel just north of Picton is a hit with the hipsters, its style similar to the quirky Drake Motor Inn, just down the road from the arty Drake Devonshire in Wellington.

The Lakeside Motel, also in Wellington, has glamping down pat, a lodge noted for its pool deck and bar. The freshly renovated Walter Motel in Bloomfield, part of Angeline’s Inn, does no-frills compact comfort in spades. And the cabin-oriented Wander the Resort on Loyalist Parkway presents upscale Canadiana with a dash of Nordic laid-back luxury. It is booked months in advance.

(Hey, Christmas is coming!)

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Following the season’s big travel trends of private and personalized luxury, the new, modern Mirazule boutique inn near the town of Milford has only four rooms, replete with luxurious fabrics, floorto-ceiling windows and decadent bathrooms. Besides the generous comfort factor and the gracious hosts, Miguel De Lemos and Ian Nelmes, the draw here is the gorgeous Art Deco everywhere you look – paintings, sculptures, an enormous walnut dining room set, an extremely cool bar. It’s almost like you’ve walked onto a movie set. A large terrace off the main floor leads to an infinity pool, and the whole place sports a spectacular vista of South Bay. This is truly a weekend waiting to happen to you.

Or maybe the middle of the week is when you pitch up? Why not? You’re working from home anyway – you might as well do it with a view.

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DOUG WALLACE is the editor and publisher of travel resource TravelRight.Today.

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FLASHBACK Angie Zapata Is Murdered (July 17, 2008)

JULY / AUGUST 2022

On July 17, 2008, Angie Zapata – a young transgender woman – was brutally murdered in an attack motivated by anti-transgender bias.

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confronted her about being transgender, grabbed her genitalia, and proceeded to viciously beat her. Then, believing her to be dead, he started ransacking her apartment. While doing that, he heard her gasping for breath and struggling to sit up as she regained consciousness. He beat her further with a fire extinguisher and killed her. Andrade then stole Zapata’s credit cards and fled the scene in her car.

Zapata was raised in Fort Lupton, Colorado, and began living full-time as a woman at the age of 16. When she was 18, she met Allen Ray Andrade, who was 31 at the time, on the social networking website MocoSpace. After exchanging emails and hundreds of text messages, the two arranged to meet, and on July 15, according to Andrade’s affidavit, the two attended a court hearing in Adams County, where Andrade had a criminal record. Later that day, Zapata allegedly performed oral sex on Andrade but refused to let him touch her sexually. The following day, according to the affidavit, Zapata left Andrade alone at her apartment for the day while she left to babysit her sister Monica’s three children. Andrade later told police that he’d begun to grow suspicious of Zapata’s gender after looking at the photographs that decorated her neat living room.

That night, he said, he confronted her about it.

Andrade was arrested two weeks later. On April 22, 2009, he was found guilty of first-degree murder, hate crimes, aggravated motor vehicle theft and identity theft. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Because Andrade had six prior felony convictions, the judge dubbed him a “habitual criminal” at his sentencing trial for the hate crime and theft convictions, and added an additional 60 years to his sentence.

Andrade told investigators he had noticed photographs that, coupled with her reluctance the previous day, raised questions about “Zapata’s sex.” When Zapata returned, Andrade says he

Andrade is serving his time at Limon Correctional Facility in Lincoln County, Colorado. Zapata is buried in the Hillside Cemetery in Fort Lupton, Colorado.

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Zapata’s sister later found her lying dead in her living room floor, covered in a sheet.

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QUESTIONS WITH CARTOONIST

NAKEDPASTOR

Tell us who you are and what you do!

I’m David Hayward, but most know me by “NakedPastor.”

I have been drawing cartoons for many years. Some of my most popular, though, are ones advocating for the LGBTQIA+ community. I also try to create spaces that are as safe as possible for people who are struggling and need a place to be heard and supported along with others.

How do you inspire or make a difference in the LGBTQ+ community?

I find my greatest contribution to the LGBTQ+ community is affirming and validating others in their own journeys. I believe in every single person’s right to be their authentic self. So I encourage everyone in their individual uniqueness and their right to live free as they truly are.

Tell us about the illustration above.

This one is called “Family Fun.” I have friends who are parents of a trans kid, and one of the parents is gay.

Complicated? Not to them! They simply choose to love and support their child. They are a happy family having family fun.

How does the community inspire you?

The community truly inspires me to work hard for the freedom of others. I see people, including friends, endure incredible hardships just because they are who they are.

They inspire me to be my true and authentic self despite the opposition or even rejection I might face. They are true examples of courage that I aspire to.

They say a picture’s worth a thousand words. It’s one thing for people to read about the LGBTQIA+ community. It’s another to see positive pictures that can challenge their traditional way of thinking and perhaps even provoke change.

What are you currently working on?

I have a new book coming out in July called Flip It Like This! So I am very busy promoting that and getting the word out. It’s a collection of about 125 cartoons with 15 never-before-seen of my best ones to date. It was a hard task choosing just this many out of the almost 5,000 cartoons I have in my arsenal.

What is your favourite thing about being a part of the LGBTQ+ community?

Simply, I love the love. Sure, every community has its issues. But I find the LGBTQIA+ community to be very open, gracious and diverse. This to me is the definition of a healthy and functional community.

Quick… Favourite movie, song and book!

Favourite movie: Oh wow…too many…but Lost in Translation comes to mind first.

Favourite song: Right now I’m listening over and over again to a beautiful instrumental by Nicholas Gunn, “Into the Vastness.”

Favourite book: Carlo Rovelli, Seven Brief Lessons on Physics.

How can people find out more about you, or follow you online?

I’m known as NakedPastor everywhere on all social media.

But my home base is nakedpastor.com, where you can see my blog and all my artwork. If you reach out, I’m very good at responding.

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