After many months of organizing in the LGBT community of Haiti, the stories we heard led us to a harsh conclusion: no community exists yet. Sure, many cliques and friend groups of "masisi" (a derogatory word in Haitian Creole that the community is now reclaiming) hang out discretely and once in a blue moon get together in the privacy of someone's home to party. Masisi from all over flock to these artful parties to dance, kiss, talk, and watch the beautiful drag queens walk the walk. The energy is extraordinary. The happiness is evidenced by the laughter, smiling, friendship, and calm from everyone being able to finally hang out and not worry about who they are or what others think. Masisi can finally breath in these safe spaces. Unfortunately, these events are rare, conducted in strict secrecy, and the life of the party does not transcend the night. Once you are back on the streets, it is business as usual for masisi: constant insults and looks, harsh discrimination, nonacceptance, an isolated double life of secrecy, and sometimes - but rarely - violence. Civil society discourse on masisi in Haiti ranges from disapproval of family and friends to religious zealots blaming gays for bringing God's wrath to the country in the form of an earthquake. Masisi are simply not tolerated on any level of society: in the family, in school, in the workplace, in public space, in political parties, on the street. Consequently, very little organizing or solidarity happens in the community due to the incessant worries of the individual trying to simply survive and be accepted.
And that's where the idea for an LGBT bar-restaurant-café-cultural center came from: we want the life of those get-togethers to become the rule and not the exception in Haiti. After many months of hanging out and discussing with gay friends and colleagues, the community has shared with us its energy and enthusiasm for change, its desire to collaborate, its capacity to organize and work, its artistic abilities and infinite talent in the form of paintings, sculptures, music, dance, and drag queen shows, and its courage in the form of taking the risk to be "out and proud." All that is missing now is a safe place where masisi can always - not sometimes - express themselves, to not only be masisi, but also live masisi as equals and no longer second class citizens of Haiti.
