By IPS Correspondents
HO CHI MINH CITY, Jul 20 2004 (IPS)

Previously, alternative lifestyles were not widely discussed in Vietnam and topics such as homosexuality were considered taboo in communist-ruled Vietnam.

But an award-winning book and its TV version are helping to bring the issue out in the open – slowly unshackling preconceived notions that homosexual acts are a display of aberrant behaviour.

”I remember having heard about two French men – my boss and his friend – making love when I was young and working at a French rubber plantation. At that time, I thought that immoral practice involved only Westerners,” 70 year-old Nguyen Minh Tri told IPS.

“But now, I understand that homosexuality may involve all kinds of people,” added Tri.

The media, indeed, has played a big role in bringing the issue out of the closet and into the public arena through a television series based on an award-winning novel.

The novel is called ‘A World Without Women’ and was written by journalist Bui Anh Tam in 2000. That year, the book won the Peace and Safety Prize awarded by Vietnam’s Police Department, the Ministry for Public Security and the Vietnam’s Writers’ Association.

The 500-page novel opens with a crime. The victim, a scientist, Dr Pham Hong Bang was very famous but still lived single. Police investigations reveal that Bang used to go to snack-bars and nigh-clubs frequented by gay people.

The alternative lifestyles of gay men and women are less visible in the capital Hanoi than in the more liberal commercial centre Ho Chi Minh City.

And it is in Ho Chi Minh City where Tam has had a long career as a crime reporter and now works for the city’s police public relations unit.

Tam told IPS he first came across gay people in his work, entering what he called ”their world” to write his crime reports.

He said he discovered a whole colourful world beyond the clichés about gay men and decided to write about them in a crime novel.

However, taking that new approach in contemporary Vietnamese literature was not so easy for Tam.

“The questions dealt in my book – homosexuality, decadent intellectuals and other social problems – do not please publishers. So they rejected my manuscripts without giving any reasons,” Tam said in an interview, explaining his efforts to get the original version of ‘A World Without Women’ published.

Tam told IPS he had to remove several paragraphs depicting graphic details of homosexual acts and also rewrite the final part of the novel, giving his main characters a ”totally different destiny”, in order to make his novel more palatable to the publishers.

”In the end, the homosexual guy turns into a heterosexual – which is something really far-fetched in the real world,” said Tam.

When scriptwriters Thuy Linh and Dinh Nhu Trang and director Vu Minh Tri began to turn “A World Without Women” into a television series recently, Tam asked them to make a film that could “express sympathy and compassion for homosexuals”.

However, the 10-part series did not meet entirely Tam’s expectations.

“The TV film translates only 50 percent of the reality contained in the book,” Tam said.

This was also the opinion of Nguyen Minh Tiep, who plays the main character in the TV film. “The series’ main theme is that homosexuality is a disorder,” Tiep said in an interview.

But then, he points out the TV serial also puts forward that ”gays are good people who deserve our understanding.”

Tiep plays the role of a policeman who manages to infiltrate into a gang of serial gay rapists to investigate the murder of the famous scientist. He pretends to be gay and befriends a “good (gay) guy” who helps him solve the crime.

Despite the current debate prompted by the Vietnamese popular media, there is still discrimination against homosexuals – prompting many of them to hide their lifestyles.

But once in a while, there have been brave attempts by gays and lesbians to bring forth their problems out in the open.

Last year, a couple of lesbians challenged authorities in Can Tho Province (Mekong Delta) by asking for a wedding certificate.

Although their demand for marriage was rejected, the couple gained much publicity, and succeeded in attracting public attention to the problems faced by homosexuals.

Recently several gays and lesbians also set up an on-line forum at the VnExpress portal (http://www.vnexpress.net) to share their feelings among the like-minded.

“When I grew up, I begin to realise that I am a gay. However, I have not had the courage to admit it,” wrote Duong Thah Long (not his real name).

”I’m tired of leading such a secret life,” he lamented on-line.

Another on-liner poster, Nguyen Linh, also spoke his mind.

”I know that my family and relatives cannot understand and accept my reality. I dare not reveal my secret to anyone. But how can I go on to living like this? When could I become really me? ” he asked.

Their laments fortunately are not gone with the wind.

The online forum has also gathered some optimistic messages.

Said a college student in a message sent to a gay young man, ”Maybe you will say, I can’t understand you because I am not gay. It’s true that I only know homosexuality though books and newspapers. But I am not insensible to your pains.”

The issue of homosexuality forms the theme again for Tam’s sequel to ‘A World Without Women’.

”My forthcoming book is called ‘Dialogue’ and unlike the ending in my previous novel, this one will be different,” he told IPS.

But the aftermath of ‘A World Without Women’ has also taken a toll on Tam. ”I have been cruelly called a pederast. My girlfriend ran away from me and a gay person sent me a love letter.”

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