It was in Ghana, West Africa, that I was asked the most troubling question by an interview subject. Being refugees, gay, unemployable, poor and despised by locals: could life be any more difficult? I was about to find out. Real names are dangerous. When he sees my camera, he runs his hand over his closely cropped head.
He tugs his earlobe, showing me it is pierced. Sekou, James and I need patience to communicate. It occurs to me that, given their violent backgrounds as war orphans, perhaps existing only in the present moment is a wise choice. The Liberian accent swallows endings of words and other consonants.
Stay connected, and tell a friend. It is apparent that Sekou and James are sex workers. In this conservative, religious, homophobic country, gay sex is a precarious undertaking. The question about HIV status passes unanswered. James suggests that he and Sekou will trade turns eating and being interviewed.
For the purposes of this story, our conversations will be reported without the Liberian accent. James orders chicken and fried rice. Sekou begins talking about life in Ghana. Because of the Liberian war violence in , I ran over the border to Ivory Coast. My father died a year earlier when I was I could not do it β take a woman who lived with my father.
They demanded I follow the custom. Have sex with my stepmother. Not bush-fighter soldiers; only town soldiers had money. Guys liked me. They fed me and I could sustain myself. We are not given the right to have MSM men who have sex with men , but the war made rapes common. Children, women, everyone. People take advantage in armed conflict. You have no means of surviving. Men with guns can do anything to anybody. Sekou does not tell me how he managed to avoid being conscripted as a child soldier.
