Adam's Odyssey between the waters of identity
Ya Almannian Alzeyn and Yasfarr Alzhein
Ya Khumandin and a Khuyl Albrienin
Here is Modey Osini's Affirmative
Tungni Al Manin Al Mann Yurri
“O pretty goldfinch with yellow wings,
with red cheeks, with black eyes.
You've been in a sad cage for years.
Singing in a nostalgic and soft voice,
no one knows where your song comes from.” *
This Sunday, Montreal will be adorned with the shimmering colors of the rainbow. The streets will resound with powerful music and the costumes will rival each other in creativity. The Pride Parade will be in full swing. But behind this festive scene will hide forgotten stories and experiences that are too often relegated to the shadows. That of Adam Darko is one of them. We met this New Canadian of Algerian origin in Montreal, on the banks of the St. Lawrence River, to listen to his story.
Adam, Between Two Banks
Adam Darko carefully extends his emerald green picnic tablecloth on the ground. He carefully chooses a peaceful spot, between a bush and a majestic tree. His gaze is fixed on the two imposing residential buildings that, like sentinels, frame on either side the portion of the urban beach where we are located.
For Adam, the constraints associated with the sex assigned at birth as well as the barriers of his gender appeared to him from his early youth. He knows that, like a stream, the incessant fluctuations between these two banks, the fluidity of the elements — sexuality, gender identity —, follow their course, make their way between pre-established contours.
If this Montrealer introduces himself today as a transgender man Queer, this was not the case during his youth in Algiers. He then had a different perception of himself. “Towards the end of my adolescence, when I was still in Algeria, I was dating a young woman and I called myself a lesbian,” he says with a laugh. Indeed, her sex assigned at birth — female — did not correspond to her true identity. “After explaining to my girlfriend at the time my feelings about my body and gender, she asked me, “Are you trans?” At the time, I had not yet understood what that word meant. But over the course of my research, this identity resonated with me,” recalls the 27-year-old young man with a smile.
After this revelation, Adam considered leaving his native country, Algeria. “I kept telling my dad that we had to get passports, even if we didn't have any trips planned.” At the dawn of his 20th birthday, he reached a breaking point. “I had the feeling that I was about to explode. And then, one day, everything spilled out. I could no longer bear the pressure of having to live up to gender expectations. I spontaneously made my Coming Out as a trans man in my family.”
This news has upset Adam's family. Except for one of his four brothers, everyone criticized and rejected him. “My father could not believe his ears and even threatened to kill me. My mom tried to protect me, but she couldn't be openly supportive. I felt incredibly alone in my circle of friends and family, especially as I lost a lot of friends as well.”
He is silent as a group of young people pass by. A few seconds pass, and her brown eyes cling to the space between two buildings. Then, he resumed in a peaceful tone: “After my Coming Out, I cut my hair very short and started wearing more traditionally masculine clothes.”
This decision shows great courage, because in Algeria, Queeritude is not socially accepted. The sudden aesthetic change and adoption of a more androgynous style by Adam did not go unnoticed and exposed him to continuous harassment on the street. To this must be added that the Algerian Penal Code punishes Homosexuality and the” Outrage against public decency ” with a sentence of up to three years in prison.
Lost, Adam gets in touch with the community Queer Algerian. Without support, he decided to launch a YouTube channel to share his experience. “Many Algerians and North Africans Queers and people from Western countries started to contact me.” This community proved to be vital for Adam; it provided him with support, kinship, and solutions. “I met a lot of Algerians who were also considering leaving the country for safety reasons. Everyone had their own story and their own methods of leaving. One of my online friends chose Malaysia and recommended it a lot to me, because this country is one of those for which Algerians do not need to apply for an entry visa.”
The body, a migration towards the self
Over time, Adam was able to ease tensions with his father. With the support of his brother, he convinced his mother that the threat hanging over him in Algeria was too great. “I remember going home and telling my mother that I had been harassed again, that living there had become unbearable. Going out had become dangerous. Gradually she started to understand the situation.”
The following year his Coming Out, Adam persuaded his parents to let him go study in Malaysia. “In reality, I didn't have a specific plan, but leaving Algeria was already a better option than staying there. So I came up with a lie, I said that I wanted to continue my studies in Malaysia. Even though they hesitated until the last moment, the fact that it was a Muslim country worked in my favor.”
It was therefore on a beautiful sunny day in August 2017 that the young Algerian left his native land to go to Malaysia. Once there, he shares his daily life with the friend who recommended that he go into exile in this country. After a few months, he found housing and undeclared work, in the absence of a work permit.
“Once settled, I started my physical transition. I bought hormones on the black market. Given my vulnerability as a migrant, the vendor practically defrauded me by selling me the hormones at an excessive price and giving me inadequate instructions for use. The hormones I was taking were supposed to be used over a longer period of time and not as frequently as he told me,” he said.
The memories come back and numb Adam. Her eyes with long black eyelashes close, and her head turns to the sky, as the leaves of the trees twirl in the breeze. He brushed his beard before continuing: “It was really risky, injecting myself with hormones without having reliable references. I relied on the advice of my friends, but their expertise was not necessarily better than mine. I don't recommend this approach. But at the time, as a tourist, I had no other option.”
“O pretty goldfinch”
Despite this risk taking, Adam says he lived a relatively pleasant life in Malaysia. However, the lack of a stable immigration status weighed on him. “I only had a tourist visa, and I was constantly feeling anxious. My life was a constant worry. I tried to get a student visa but was refused. I also saw several of my friends spend considerable amounts of money processing immigration files and deal with lawyers who finally pocketed the money without even filing the applications.”
Meanwhile, Adam is in contact on the Internet with the Arab LGBTQ+ community, who suggest that he seek asylum in Malaysia. However, refugees have no legal status there, the authorities do not distinguish between undocumented migrants and refugees. They have no right to protection. They are at risk of being turned away and live constantly in fear of being arrested and expelled from the country.
Adam is still applying for refugee status at the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Kuala Lumpur. In this way, he hopes to benefit from the protection of the international organization. This process involves extensive interviews and a long wait for a possible resettlement in another country. However, no protection is offered to him in the meantime.
To extend his tourist visa in Malaysia, Adam must leave the country and go to Indonesia. But when he returns to Malaysia, when he returns for an interview with a UNHCR agent, he faces a major obstacle: border officials notice that his passport photo does not match his physical appearance. Finding out that he is transgender and that he has illegally extended his visa, they refuse him entry into Malaysia. Despite his refugee status application document, he was detained at the airport, without business or passport, and spent the night there.
The resettlement interview process with UNHCR was ongoing, but Adam was deported to Indonesia the day after he returned to Malaysia. In Indonesia, he was refused entry again, as Malaysia did not allow him to pass. Again, his refugee claim file does not offer him any protection. The Indonesian authorities are even considering sending him back to Algeria, an option that is not an option.
His story freezes us; Adam offers us a break. He grabs a speaker he brought with him to the beach, and the voice of the Algerian singer Naïma D'ziria sounds: “O pretty goldfinch with yellow wings, red cheeks, black eyes. You've been in a sad cage for years. Singing in a nostalgic and soft voice, no one knows where your song comes from.” * Adam looks at a little bird that is lost in the trees. A smile is drawn on her lips, then her face darkens, her gaze is fixed on the reflections of the Sun in the windows facing us..
“The first few days spent at this airport in Jakarta, I felt like I was in a cage. My passport was a source of profound humiliation. I was belittled and treated like a criminal,” he said.
The days then passed slowly, until a UNHCR agent contacted Adam. “He informed me that they were in talks with Canada and that they thought the country might be interested in my case.” A smile stretched the corners of his lips. “When I lived in Algiers, I followed the Pride celebrations in Montreal. The idea that Canada would one day welcome me was a huge hope for me. Canada has become my anchor, my lifebuoy. It was the only thing that kept me afloat during these 20 nights spent on the airport floor.”
After three hellish weeks, the long-awaited call rings out: Adam can leave this limbo to fly to Canada the next day. On the last night he spent in Indonesia, lying on the airport floor, he let himself be carried away by his dreams as he thought about his new life. “An euphoria that I had never felt came over me. As if my being were floating on a cloud, in suspension. An almost unreal sensation, as if a dream were coming to life. It took me a while to realize that it was all real. It all seemed almost too good to be true.”
The Pride deception
In 2018, Adam finally left his cage to land in Montreal, where he settled down. During the first summer, he finally fulfilled his wish to attend the Pride Parade. “I remember going there with friends. Queers Algerians I had met online. During the march, I saw someone with the Algerian flag. It touched me deeply. I felt validated. In fact, in 2019, I myself carried the flag of my native country. I was genuinely proud.”
Now a Canadian, Adam feels that the charm of his first Pride parade has lost some of its strength. “The parade has become an opportunity for businesses and brands to put themselves forward. It has become a show of support ostensibly for 2SLGBTQ+ people, but it does not translate into a real investment in their lives, their power and their aspirations,” he said.
However, he remains convinced that this parade still has important political significance. “By participating in it, you are asserting your presence and claiming your right to exist. It has a particular meaning for those who have not had or currently do not have the privilege of being themselves safely and freely,” he explains.
He also mentions another disappointment, that related to the Gay Village. “I remember that at the beginning, I was very happy to go to this neighborhood. But over time, I started to perceive microaggressions,” he says, nodding his head. We have the impression that we are not really part of the group, that we are not represented. Unless you are a gay, cisgender, and generally white male, it can be difficult to find your place in the Village. There are not even lesbian or trans bars. If you look closely, most of the activities there are focused on the gay community.”
Young Adam continues: “Don't they remember who started all this? Who threw the first bricks at Stonewall? They were trans women of color, and yet they don't fit in this rainbow village.”
According to him, there is a lot of racism in spaces. Queers where white people are in the vast majority. “People don't understand where we're from. They can be Queers, but that doesn't stop them from being intolerant of us. They always feel that we are riding a camel back home, as if there was no civilization in our countries of origin,” regrets the New Canadian. He recalls that, during a party organized at the Gay Village, he was refused something as simple as having music from his country or the Arab-Amazigh world played. “It's exhausting because we have to constantly educate them. Explain to them that identity Queer is not a Western invention. Figures Queers existed before and after Islam; just think of poets like Abu Nouwâs or actors like Hanan El Tawil, who is a trans woman. [The normative aspect of genres] is rather a colonial concept that we have unfortunately internalized,” he adds.
Then, he says with optimism: “We still have a long way to go, but at least we are on the right track.”
The privilege of going unnoticed: a double-edged sword
The Sun begins to decline in the city's sky and tints the St. Lawrence with an orange glow. Adam runs his hand over his beard and continues: “These perceptions are really problematic, because people Queers and trans people don't think I'm part of their community when they see me. Sometimes I am associated with the image of bearded Arab men who the media have often portrayed as terrorists or a source of intolerance and hate.”
After arriving in Canada, Adam continued his hormonal transition and underwent a mastectomy, a procedure to remove the chest to achieve a more masculine torso. This transformation allows him to “pass” for a cisgender and heterosexual man. Unless you know him personally, you can't guess that he's trans. “In general, it's a privilege because I'm invisible and I don't get the attention of people who are intolerant or hateful.”
According to him, this is what allows him to go to Maghreb neighborhoods without risking verbal attacks. “I would even say that, in these environments, I feel safer and more confident than women”, he says, referring to cafes, which are generally frequented by men. “I do not reveal my transidentity or my sexual orientation, I remain discreet to avoid any conflict.”
However, he points out that the Maghreb community is not homogeneous, that not all of its members are transphobic: “There is a lot of fear on our side (2SLGBTQ+). An ingrained fear, which comes from the discrimination we have suffered from our own compatriots, in our countries. Sometimes that fear lodges in us and can lead us to judge others indiscriminately.”
According to Adam, there is a big divide in the North African community between straight people and Queers. “At the Pride parade, I rarely see straight North African people who are allies and who support us. It saddens me, even though I understand the reasons**. I would have liked us to mix, safely,” he confides.
Adam lets out a sigh. “Finally, I'm home,” he says. While he is talking to us, ducklings and a duck pass by us. This painting reminds him of his own family: “I have only seen my mother on a screen since 2017.” Now with a Canadian passport, he sees the possibility of finding her outside Algeria.
The sky is getting dark, Adam is getting ready to go home. We leave it with the impression that, like the discreet oases of the Algerian Sahara, it has always been this river that dances endlessly. Its flows are an enigma hidden in historical stories, a presence hidden under grains of sand — and yet water persists. So Adam never gave up. Like a stream that flows relentlessly, he has migrated to the essence of his being.
*Excerpt from the popular Algerian song entitled Maknine Ezzine (Ô Joli Chardonneret), written during the independence war by Mohamed el-Badji while he was in custody and waiting for his execution.
**To see further: Queer Ramadan: breaking the fast and the barriers — La Converse