This time next Sunday the Gaybombay Parents meet will be going on. I've lost count of which number this is - maybe the 6th or 7th time we're having it. Whatever the numbers its easily one of the most amazing GB events and I would really urge everyone who can to attend it - with or without parents! Sadly, I won't be able to attend it myself this year, but as a tribute of sorts I'd like to post two things The first is a link to this really moving letter from a father to his son. Joel Derfner's Search for Love in Manhattan blog isn't normally this serious, but this letter really packs a punch: http://www.joelderfner.com/blog/2003/02/after_writing_yesterdays_post.html And on a lighter note, my column from the current issue of TimeOut Mumbai. I don't normally post it online when its still on the stands (buy the magazine!), but I'm doing so since the Parents meet is this week and this is about a little discussed aspect of the parent and gay child relationship - the different sorts of saas-bahu problems it throws up! Queer I Tu Tu Men Men Ally Gator, TimeOut Mumbai My friend C has a wonderfully supportive mother. She doesnt bat an eyelid when he brings boyfriends home for the night, only asking them next morning what they want for breakfast. C says that their reactions to this offer can be dramatic: Most of them get freaked out, leave at once and are never seen again. But those that stay fall in love with my mother. C tells me, with some exasperation, that there are ex-boyfriends he has long broken with, but who still call his mother, asking her advice or wanting to take her out shopping. This could be seen as proof of how Indian men, gay or straight, are all obsessed with mothers. So if their own mothers are less than supportive they desperately look for other mother figures to latch on to. The Gaybombay group has meetings for gay men and their parents which are hugely attended, particularly by gay men who arent out or who dont have the support of their mothers. So they some to the meet and latch on to the mothers who do come, perhaps seeking from them the maternal solace they cant get at home. Where this gets complicated is when mothers meet the boyfriends of their sons, the one twist on Saas-Bahu relations sadly unlikely ever to be featured by Ektaa Kapoor. Quite often, of course, the relations are as bad as the worst that any K-serial gets, with the saas fury against the man who lead her beta astray combining with queasiness about what they actually do in bed (Just try not to think about the arse thing, one mother of a gay son advises another in the wonderful British serial Queer As Folk). Yet, surprisingly often, saas and boyfriend hit it off well. Partly, I think, his being male helps since she knows that at least her status as Most Important Woman in her sons heart is secure. Sometimes she finds in him traits that are missing from her son. Worse, sometimes they team up against the son! One of my friends mothers was so charmed by the boyfriend that she promptly changed her line on his leading her son astray. Its you, you wretch, who must have corrupted him, she hissed at her son. Mostly though mothers prefer to convey their sentiments indirectly, through gifts. A friends mother, who has never really discussed his sexuality, recently called to say that she was sending His n His towels for his boyfriend and him, so what colour would they like them in? My own boyfriend and my mother fall somewhere midpoint on the Saas-Boyfriend Support Scale. Theyve met and liked each other, but arent too comfortable with each other either. The problem I realise is that theyre both rather alike: very intelligent, charismatic prima donnas, who love traveling and some turmoil in their life. Which leads me to a dismaying realization: have I really done that most stereotyped Indian male thing, falling for a man who could be his mother?!
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