For that last three years Out My Closet has extended our services across international borders to support under-resourced and marginalized communities, from supporting children in the interior regions of Guyana, to supporting an orphanage in the Dominican Republic and this year, supporting transgender women in Havana, Cuba.
Out My Closet delivered a tremendous number of resources including, clothing, shoes, cosmetics, hygiene products, beauty aids (nails, eye accessories, and wigs), sexual health contraceptives in support of Trans Cuba.
Trans Cuba is a part of The National Center for Sex Education (Spanish: Centro Nacional de Educación Sexual, CENESEX) is a government-funded body founded in 1989 in Cuba. The center is best known for advocating tolerance of LGBT issues on the island. The head of the center is Mariela Castro, daughter of the Cuban politician and former president of the Federation of Cuban.
Team OMC, with Mariela Castro at Havana Pride.
While things are changing for the gay community, trans-people, although not officially counted in national census's have the highest rates of HIV in Cuba, a country with the lowest rates of HIV in the western hemisphere.
Malu Calabrara is a transgender woman who is an activist for transgender rights. She works with CENESEX and Castro to run the Trans Cuba network. Started in 2001, it is the only national social network for trans people in the country, designed to build social awareness, HIV prevention and family counseling.
Team OMC with Malu Calabrara, Trans Cuba's President.
The TransCuba Network is comprised of about 3,000 people and of those people "more than 90 percent of the transgender people in Cuba live with HIV," Calabra said before one of the workshops she and TransCuba are running in Havana.
Malu—who is HIV positive herself—attributes these numbers to the amount of trans-people practicing prostitution. "I left my house at a very early age, when I was 13 years old," Malu remembered. "Then I came to live in the Capital City—of course I had a life full of prostitution, of crazy things," she added.
Many trans-people move to Havana from the outer provinces and rent apartments. However, there is a price for sexual liberation in the more accepting capital city. Rents are high and as a result many turn to prostitution.
Team OMC offering encouraging words to the clients of Trans Cuba.
OMC's President, Michael Narain with George Maestre, who organized resources with NYC Night Life allies in support of the campaign, supplying wigs, cosmetics and other beauty resources for clients.
Check out some more behind the scenes images on our Instagram Page @outmyclosetorg
Supporting Transgender women has always been a dual mission of Out My Closet. We've supported many trans lead and trans populous organization in NYC, South Florida and D.C.. Specifically, the Trans Latina organizations that OMC has supported were Ariana Center in Fort Lauderdale and CITG (Colectivo Intercultural TRANSgrediendo) in Jackson Heights, Queens NY. Recently OMC conducted a POP-UP shop to support CITG at their site, pictured below.
