Richard Ammon. But Tunisia has a history of moderation and balance between Western and Muslim ideas and lifestyles. Ironically much of this happened under the year governance of a corrupt and dictatorial president who was driven from office in early that started the infamous 'Arab Spring. Most are not and they live within the confines and closets imposed by conservative Muslim dictates of modesty and discretion. The people I interviewed were fortunate not to be fearful in their daily lives.
Both were comfortable talking aloud to me as I took notes and asked personal questions about their lives, loves and sexuality. In Tunisia gay life has many faces: from secretive post-marital same-sex-not-gay quickies among straight husbands, to ongoing pre-marital youth same-sex-not-gay with friends, to totally gay friendship networks among different age peers, to monogamous boyfriend couples to discrete liaisons from the internet.
There is no LGBT organization or office. During my visit I chatted with two very different gay men, one a young student at a local university and the other a retired Italian resident of Tunis now self-employed. Their gay worlds are similar and different. Ari, a university student studying architecture, and I met at tea time and had creamy thick hot chocolate at a trendy modern coffee shop and later went for pizza across the street.
Ari is a gregarious gay youth of 20 maturing out of his twink years. Thoughtful, expressive, verbal 4 languages , introspective, narcissistic and gay. All of which fuel an adventurous spirit of discovery and wonder and also ennui with the world around him. Despite the early hopes of the Tunisian political revolution of subsequent elections brought an Islamist party to majority power due mostly to the secularists splintering into separate parties and unable to unite.
More than one gay person believes the former authoritarian government was at least more tolerant of LGBT citizens than the present one. He has long range plans to emigrate to Europe—Italy or Belgium—where there are open gay communities. But in his private life he does neither. Currently he is dating a French telecom technician whom he met online at Manhunt. French, along with Arabic, is the major language here; sophisticated Tunisians prefer to speak French.
