Organizing Pride

 

 

I barely got away from home, and I already dove head first into finding queer cultural places and events in my new city. I wanted to claim this place with all my being, especially since I was dating a girl at that time, and she really didn't want to go out in public with me. Not even to hold hands. No parties, either, only if it was Very Straight. So I wanted to find us safe spaces, and in fact, the only time we kissed outside of "the four walls", was at a party specifically organized for queer women (though straight women were also welcome, and men tolerated, if chaperoned by a woman). This resulted in me finding (but not actually visiting) the city's one gay bar. and then, later, desperate, searching for the terms "cluj pride", but mentally I was already disappointed, because I assumed we only did Pride in Bucharest.

I was wrong. It was a happy accident, maybe, but my search did bring up a website (that is still up today!). At the time, in March, it only consisted of a banner, and encouraged us to STAY TUNED, so I did. I checked at least once a day, and when they finally gave us the opportunity to volunteer, I would have signed away my life for the chance. Photography? I'd suck, but sure! Flyers? Sure! Anything! As the days passed, more and more videos appeared, sort of advertising the event, but also just raising awareness of how shitty queer people feel here. All of them began with "spune drept", that is, "be honest", and asked (sometimes quite pointy) questions from the viewer. Then, one day, in the organizers' group, a question popped up: who speaks Hungarian? I do! This resulted in me doing some checkups and translations for the website, for videos and the official event sheet. I wanted to be the fastest and most efficient being on the planet. Truly, this is where I gave my all, any job of mine would be jealous. I did get some help from my (now) ex, as she spoke better Romanian than me, and checked some grammar mistakes.

I'm gonna note here, this event wasn't only a march (that's why we had an entire event sheet, after all). It was a four-day festival, with events ranging from lounging in the park, to anarchist cookouts, to an afterparty in the gay bar. And even the march itself wasn't "traditional": we didn't show up in "rainbow underwear" to "corrupt kids and shock aunties", there was no music and there were no brands sponsoring us. This was an expression of the personal being political, this was a protest against the way we'd been treated, and maybe, somewhere, this was indeed us trying to be "respectable gays", "almost like you, but we hold hands with our same gender". We wore white T-shirts, on our chest we had the logo of the event: a speech bubble, and #spunedrept. We would march in silence, with our flags and banners.

Two meetings stand out to me: one we had in the only gay bar of the city, more specifically, in its courtyard. I remember winged ants falling all over me, and I remember I had tried to shave my legs, but was too hurried, so, still hairy. In this meeting, I got introduced to The Flags: one of them was a bright and long flag, that we would hold along its edges as we marched; and the other was an old one, with visible stitching and duller, but somehow more charming colours. The old one, if I recall correctly, came from the United States, from gread activists, maybe it was even connected to Stonewall somehow. It was a relic. And, as relics do sometimes, it disappeared after being hanged for decoration at the cookout.

The organizers had to have the march route approved by the city hall - and this was simply not happening. This was the topic of another meeting, held in some old building, clearli used for political organizing. I remember a banner there, it said something like "civil disobedience - the Gandhi way". We all sat in one large room, and started discussing our options: what would happen, if no route is accepted? Would we do the march as a disguised event? Would we have police there? Would we need police? So many people said they wouldn't show up if there were no police. All this vulnerability was entirely new to me, I'd always assumed I could just kick out any bully's teeth. Seeing this many people who not only wouldn't walk with their partners on the street, but wouldn't even appear in a large crowd, for fear of violence perhaps, really made an impression on me. As did the comments inciting violence that were left on news articles about us. Either way, I'd really recommend for straight people to once at least witness this, though maybe it needs to be more personal for you to be able to empathise.

And later, even after my country's homophobic referendum died a slow death, I still wouldn't trust a person on the street. I'd been wanting to move to Hungary in 2020, but they pumped themselves full of homophobia, and now I wouldn't feel safe.

A few days passed after that discussion, and I met with "our" lawyer on the street. I assume she'd been helping the main organizers, pro bono. She let me know, with the whitest smile on the planet, that we finally had an approved route!

During the days leading up to the march itself, I was the most active in T-shirt and banner-making workshops. I first went to document people's creativity. In the T-shirt making workshop, people would bring a white tee, then be provided with a stencil and some spray paint, and this allowed them to put the speech bubble and event hashtag anywhere they please, whereas the official tees had them printed on the chest. Initially, I just stuck to taking pictures of all the different banners, handheld signs and painting materials. Then, a group of Hungarian people showed up and wanted to make their own T-shirts, with the hashtag in Hungarian, naturally. We didn't have the stencil for that, so the group tried to compromise, then we organized the thing, we designed it, I cut it out and we were ready to paint.

Of course, running amok in a carneval setting has its charm, too, but our times didn't quite allow for us to have fun. We wanted to be seen, and perhaps wanted to be seen as rational, as relentless. What made the times so un-fun, so homophobic back then? Some dude got annoyed that the Constitution defined marriage as "the union of spouses", and not "the love bond of a man and woman" or some such thing. This put into motion a machinery of political parties, religiously backed and entirely religious organizations, who would "March For Life" to protest against gays and abortion in the same breath. The actual vote was held in the fall of 2018, until then, there was no stopping this monstrosity, despite all logistical, ethical or legislative hiccups. We did manage to boycott this thing, and since then, it has died down, but those days weren't simple for me.

The approved route was on the less-central bank of our river Somes, and our walk may have been less than a kilometer. I recall it as having lasted less than an hour. Despite having had no music or dance or promiscuity, I sensed a great aura around us. We felt that we belonged to something big, something new and exciting. We had flags, both small, barely the size of my two palms, and large, the one I mentioned above. Kids ran and played under it. A few attendees had rainbow clothes or face paint (I recall someone with huge lashes and a rainbow butterfly on their face, it was mindblowingly gorgeous), they might have felt estranged from our serious aura, though. I still recall those few minutes of walking along the riverbank, with my crowd, as one extended moment of happiness. It was victory.

Of course, there were a few clouds. The weather was on our side, but religious people and the alt-right weren't. In the Orthodox cathedral of the city center, there was a marathon of prayer going on, trying to persuade any angry deity not to rain hellfire upon us (well, them). After our march was over, the alt-right held a meeting right beside this cathedral, which they called the "March for Normalcy". One of these people was free before, and paid us a visit. He stayed on the other side of the river, and chose to scream at us - what I recall is, he yelled that we were "the shame of Cluj". The cops tried to shoo him away, some looked at him with some specs, and that was it. But later, during the alt-right meeting, an actress chose to attend, wearing our tee. She came on a bike, stood at the edge of the gathering, and tried to heckle with whoever was speaking. After a few questions, the cops picked her up, stuck her in their van and drove away.

I originally wrote this piece as an assignment, hoping to get a press pass into some festivals. Therefore, it was very short and optimistic, I was trying to be palatable and only half closeted. Why wouldn't I tell y'all, my lovely audience, all what I remember, though? This is, therefore, what I've found relevant, from all my memories. Thank you for reading.