Gaby
THE YOUNGEST MEMBER ALL GROWN UP
WWW.THEMODERNQUEER.COM
welcome EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
VOL. XIII-2
00 Xzavier V. Simon 13 Gaby 65 Facebook/Instagram: @xzaviervsimon 84 Website: www.xzaviervsimon.org
49 Instagram @gabyisnotabird 98 Website:
Gaby
BY: XZAVIER V. SIMON
PHOTOS: GABY
THE YOUNGEST ALL GROWN UP
"In English, we don't differentiate between romantic and platonic love. We just put the word love on it." The Modern Queer Magazine Vol. 13-2
Four years ago, I met Gaby at Georgetown University, where she was a young teenager. Two years ago, I found out she was queer, and she became the 13th member of The Modern Queer Magazine. However, she chose to remain anonymous. Gaby hold's the mantle of being the youngest person interviewed at 17 and is currently the only queer person of Asian descent. I sent her questions through email, and she responded, and everything else is history. But amid planning Season 05, Gaby reached out to me, asking if we could sit down and talk again. She wanted to talk about the growth she's experienced since being featured, but more importantly, she wanted to reveal her face. It was a shocker and opportunity that I did not want to pass up. And just like that, we hopped on an international Zoom call because she now lives in France, and thus Vol. 13-2 was born.
I appreciate Gaby because I always learn something about and from her. She's traveled to far more countries than I have, and her knowledge of each place grows daily. Her experience, initially as an Asian American, has expanded to include her Singaporean family history—including her evolution as far as her identity. Our conversation is light-hearted, charming, and mutual admiration. It also highlight's the critical theme from the season where her first volume appeared, growth. Sit back, and please enjoy the first of what I presume to be many updates of Gaby and other Modern Queer guests.
Yo! I haven't seen you in a while. Yeah. It's been like four years. It's been a long time. Oh my God. Look at you. You all grown up now. Still look the same though. How are you? How you been?
I was thinking about that. The ace part came in cause I was dating my current boyfriend. He might come in. He's living in my room right now, and he’s been here for a week. So, if he just comes in the background, that's what's happening over there. [laughs] [laughs] Then I’m gonna say, “hi boyfriend!”
I'm okay. I just got Wi-Fi back in my house after three, four months of no Wi-Fi. In France, they're so inefficient with fixing things. Well, thank you again for having another interview. First, you are leading the pack with this whole thing. You still the only person of Asian descent to be a part of this. You still hold the title of being the youngest. And now you're the first for a part two. You’re on it! Wow. Thank you for giving me this opportunity. Off the bat, my first question is, why now? Why now have you decided to reveal your identity? I think I kind of like, not really discovered, cause I think it was always inherent. Obviously, your sexuality is something that is inherent, but I kind of came to terms with the fact that I think like I might be ace after I came out of high school. It was through an anime that one of my other ace friends recommended to me. And I didn't know he was ace when he recommended it to me. So I watched it, and then I was like, damn, what if?
I was dating him at the time, and I realized I don’t get turned on by looking at people’s bodies. It doesn’t do anything for me. The weirdest thing about it is that with sexuality, you never really sit down and think about it. You just think that everybody else is also. It’s like, if you were colorblind, [which] I’m also colorblind [laughs], but if you were color blind and didn’t know that you were color blind, you would think that everybody else sees the world how you see the world. That’s how I realized, hey, wait. People don’t like that, don’t see it like that? In my first year of college, I was sort of on autopilot cause high school was rough for me. I’m going to college in France, and apparently college in France, it’s supposed to be a step up from high school. And college in France feels like high school. I was stressed. So, every time you were sending me those articles, I was like, oh, that’s cool. I remember I did that. Thanks for reminding me. And then only now I’ve re-read it, and I was like, wait, I’m so different now. I’ve changed a lot.
Because in English, we don't differentiate between romantic and platonic love. We just put the word love on it. I thought that love was one thing, obviously. But then I was like, wait. There's other types of love. And then I realized I've never been interested in anything romantic. I think I like companionship. I don't like romance. That's when I started to come to terms with it. I identify as aroace now.
Yeah. Putting everything into like physical copies now, which I didn't have access to that back then, was a moment. Having to go back and reread them, I was like, wow. It kind of took me back to who you were at Georgetown. And then to watch you over Instagram evolve, grow up, and travel all over the place, I was like, damn.
Aroace for those that don’t know, including myself, who had to look up the actual definition, is someone who does not experience romantic or sexual attraction. It is a term used to describe people who are both aromatic and asexual.
I mean, for this, this is literally like, who is she? Your cover photo for the first one was of you snowboarding in full gear. We got one photo of you looking out the window. And then we got another of you at the skate park, but it's your back.
Yeah. It's crazy. Like, who is she?
SEASON 02 VOL. XIII APR '20
GABY
THE MULTI-ETHNIC ASIAN AMERICAN TEENAGER STEPS FORWARD TO TALK ABOUT WHAT'S ON HER MIND, HER HEART, AND HER SOUL.
SOCIAL MEDIA
"I WANT PEOPLE TO HAVE AN IDEA OF WHO I AM IF THAT MAKES SENSE. IT’S LIKE, I DON’T WANT IT TO BE WHO PEOPLE TO THINK I AM."
But for this, we get like full frontal pictures. [laughs] Like the veil has been pulled back, and it's, hello everybody. I'm here for all this, though. One of the things that stuck out to me when I read our conversation was that you were talking about how your mom wanted you to think about your social media presence. You were kind of nervous, but it also added to the sort of mystique or mystery behind you. Do you still feel that same way about social media, or are you like, fuck it, we out here now? I think kind of its 50-50. Because I think social media is complicated and it’s interesting. I think it’s because I’m an Economics and Sociology major, so this is one of my areas that I’m like a huge nerd about.
Obviously, this has been said a thousand times before, but it’s like who we are on social media is totally different from who we are in real life. So when I talk to you right now, at least I would think that I would be totally different from how I appear or how I present myself on social media. Makes total sense. I want people to have an idea of who I am if that makes sense. It’s like, I don’t want it to be who people to think I am. I want it to be as true to myself as possible. I think I’m a little more forgiving with myself now about the kind of mistakes that I make on social media.
With social media, it’s like all your mistakes are public, and I don’t think it is inherently a bad thing because you also grow from it in a different way, I would say. I don’t have a huge following. I’ve got like a thousand people following me, which is normal for somebody my age who’s moved around as much as I have—three different countries. You’ve got a thousand people, maybe 500 of them regularly watch your stories or keep up with your content and stuff. 500 of them will call you out on some bullshit if you do some bullshit. [laughs]
Facades. Yeah. It’s like different faces. Sometimes I’m serious, and sometimes I’m in a mood, and I don’t want to fuck with nobody. And then sometimes I feel sexy or want to express my feelings about somebody or feel comfortable sharing my honest thoughts. So it’s like this is who I am in this moment, and it is what it is. And if you don’t like it, I guess that’s your problem. Yeah.
[laughs] And I think, honestly, that's good for me. I'm starting to understand, okay, this wasn't cool; this wasn't okay for me to do. Then you learn and grow from that. And you learn from it quickly because stories are 24 hours long, and people are super quick to reply. So, within 24 hours, you could be a different person the next day. [laughs] But that’s interesting. I never thought about it that way. If one reflected and took to heart what people said, perhaps they would become a different person. That's where I think I'm a little less cautious now. I know how to learn from my mistakes. I know how to bounce back. I know if I say some stupid shit, someone's going to tell me that was stupid, and then I know how to apologize for it now. So I am a little more forgiving about being cautious on social media. I think inherently, especially with people my age and in my generation, gen Z, nothing you do is private. It’s a give and take. What I’ve come to recognize about social media is that you still have an element of control, right? It’s how much are you willing to share? If you’re not ready to share it, then don’t share. Cool if you don’t care and can handle whatever critique, criticism, or bullshit. But you’re spot on. I noticed that people form opinions and beliefs about me from my social media life, although we might’ve met in person once or twice. I’ve also had experiences where people believe they know me based on what I post. I think I’m learning that I have multiple, what’s the word…
Another thing from your article was how you talked about Singapore and the laws around queer people in Singapore. Then you presented that issue to a very mute audience at a conference. I know you were there recently before you came back to France, so has anything changed in the last couple of years and your opinion of what you've seen? I think this is going to be my answer for everything I tell you, but I can't tell how much has changed because of how much I've changed. When you become an adult, you couldn't do certain things when you were a kid. When I was 17 years old, I was not going to drag shows. I didn't even know that was a thing that happened in Singapore. I didn't think we had any gay culture. Maybe for a bit of like historical context, there was a downtown area called Bugis. B U G I S. Thank you spelling that out. [laughs] In Bugis, it was like the transvestite area. There were a lot of like trans prostitutes. It was like the gay culture, the nightlife, and the hot place to be in the eighties and early nineties. Then in the mid-nineties, it was kind of like stomped out. It was gentrified by the government. And then we never really got that same sort of queer culture back. Sounds like what according to April.
happened
in
Chicago
7 1 s a w I n e h "W I , d l o years o t g n i o g t o n s a w " . s w o h drag s
"I went to see my very first drag show with my dad." LIFE IN SINGAPORE
There isn’t that sort of like LGBT culture in Singapore, but there are little pockets of space. You have to look very hard, know who to look for, and know where to look. After that [Modern Queer] interview, I made a lot more local friends. Through that, I realized there’s a lot that I was missing about living in Singapore. I went to see my very first drag show with my dad.
who can handle myself. I think this same thing personally. I don’t think it would have happened if I had gone to college in the U.S. I literally handle my entire life on my own [in France], from grocery shopping to rent, to like electricity bills to Wi-Fi. Like I called the Wi-Fi people with my shitty broken French. [laughs] They’re like, wow, you’re functioning like an adult, and it makes me feel good. It’s nice.
WHAT! [laughs] Yeah. I learned something that I didn't even know about him. My dad went to law school and university. There was this bar called Cheers in the Bugis area. In the height of that, he worked at a musical bar. He worked there as a waiter and drummer, and there working with him, was Singapore's original drag queen Kumar. And I had no idea about this until we went to the drag show, and we talked about it. He was like, yeah, there used to be gay culture in Singapore. I was like, that's crazy. That's hilarious because going back to your relationship with your parents. You didn't know how they would respond to your evolving identity. That's incredible that you were able to go to a drag show with your dad. How was that? Was that a liberating experience for you to be able to do that? I think it was a bit awkward. Firstly, I didn’t know that my dad had worked in a drag bar. I think my parents don’t fully understand what it means to be aroace, but for me, I think that’s okay. I think they don’t need to understand. Cause they’re just like you’re happy, I’m happy. It’s fine. I don’t need them to understand because I can’t even explain this to like people my age. So, it was awkward mainly because we had never done something like that before. Then also, growing up, I wasn’t particularly close to my parents. But both of us have grown a lot in the last like three years. When you leave for college, you and your parents do the most growing in your lifetime. We came back two completely different people, and we were like getting along all of a sudden. It was great, and it was awesome. [laughs] I was like, oh my God, who are these people? But I think there’s also an aspect I’ve matured, and their opinion of me has matured. I’m fully recognized as an adult
I think that's an incredibly beautiful process to come into your own. Well, I can say that now anyway. [laughs] Yeah definitely. You realize you can handle some things that you might not have thought you could. And perhaps handle it better than a lot of your peers. But you say you learned a lot more about Singapore and dove a little deeper into it. Plus, you made some friends. So what made you decide I'm going to go and explore and have some fun and see what's out there? I think the last time we talked was literally at that turning point. That was the peak of the most American I think I had ever been. I think it’s because I’ve also kind of redefined what it means to be American in my head. I’m a third culture kid, so I’m grappling with two kinds of identities here. In China, there are different ethnic groups and dialect groups. My family comes from Southern China, but my dad comes from mainland Southern China. My mom’s family comes from an island to the south of China. They’re from two different dialect groups. Wow. Talk about a family lineage. My family came down to Singapore about a hundred-ish years ago. That’s where my family has been. My dad went to university in the U.S., and they settled down there. They have my two sisters and me. Then we moved back to Singapore. I think I was really upset. I was under the impression that it was gonna be terrible. It was not like America. We’re moving to Asia, and nobody spoke English. [laughs] I’m dying. So, you believed the typical American stereotypes too.
[laughs] When you're seven years old, you only speak English, you've never met another Asian person in your life, except for your parents and your sisters, it's like… What the fuck! [laughs] I'm stunned. Wow. My parents and their friends from the IMF (International Monetary Fund) were the only Asian people I've met in my life. My dad's mom is badass, but she wasn't very highly educated. She speaks Cantonese, which is a dialect of Mandarin Chinese. And then she speaks conversational Mandarin Chinese because they're a bit similar, but they're not quite the same, but she can't read or write. We send each other voice messages now on WhatsApp. [laughs] She came to babysit my middle sister and me when my youngest sister was born. That weekend when my sister was born, my parents realized we have to move back and immerse our kids in their culture. It wasn't trauma, but it was more like little kid trauma of moving somewhere where you're totally unfamiliar with. [laughs] And it was a total change. [laughs] Damn. We lived in Maryland, so there were four seasons. In Singapore, there’s only one. It’s either humid or it’s raining. [laughs] It’s humid, or it’s more humid. We moved from a house into an apartment because housing is expensive in Singapore. We moved from this landed house with a garden into a concrete apartment, and I was like, what’s going on? Because of that, I think I always embraced this idea like I’m American for the longest time. So, I totally rejected the idea of being Singaporean. For the longest time, I think I was a bit blind to the fact that my entire family thought I was fucking weird. [laughs] It’s like the one white cousin. I was the white cousin for the longest time, and it was embarrassing. [laughs] Nooooooo. [laughs] In Singapore, there’s this schooling system where you are bilingual from the time you go into kindergarten.
You have to pick a mother tongue. Because I was already seven and did not speak any Mandarin at all, they couldn’t have put me into the local school stream. They put me into the international school stream, which I think, for a while, they were seeing as a big mistake once I got to high school. By the time I got to high school, you go to school with rich white ex-pats, and eventually, you get sick of it. I think I’m glad about that because I think I did not quite fit in in terms of wealth. My family was Singaporean middle class. Which I guess globally, that’s well off, but in Singapore, that’s normal. We’re an average Singaporean family, and I’m going to school with all these people who are like super fucking rich. The level of self-awareness was like this, is not it. So, I picked up skating, and that was when I had the opportunity to meet a lot of like local friends who didn’t go to my school. And they’re some of my closest friends to this day. Those are the friends that I’ve made that have changed my life. They’ve really changed my view. That was really nice for me to get to open my eyes. That’s kinda how I felt when I was at Georgetown, especially that second summer. I didn’t come from money. My family had a little bit of it but not like how they were spending it at Georgetown. [laughs] It was weird to see highschoolers talk about the different countries they visited or hear parents talking about vacation homes or the flight overseas they were about to take once they dropped their child off at the university. Yeah, I think Georgetown was also a turning point for my parents. There's this immigrant idea that, like when immigrants go to college in the U.S., if you don't go to a U.S. college, it's going to be hard for you to make it. I think Georgetown was like a wakeup call for my parents because they wanted me to go so that I would get kind of a foot up to go to Georgetown because I wanted to study political science. After paying for that, they realized it's paper credit now. This is how much three credit credits costs. We cannot afford 36 credits.
"Those are the
friends that I've
made that have
changed my life."
"I like to take my traveling photos on film because I feel film has this slow feeling to it." A INTER-CONTINENTAL TRAVELER
LIFE IN FRANCE
"THE PEOPLE IN PARIS ARE SO MEAN."
There's no fucking way. When hell fucking freezes over. [laughs] We tried all these fucking crazy things. I think my parents were losing it. I think they were having an existential crisis, and they weren't gonna tell me because they didn't want me to think my life was over because we can't afford college. Because my parents aren't American, they don't pay American taxes, and I can't get any cuts, and I can't get any benefits.
I would go to French class and think in Spanish. But now, my brain has started to kind of separate my languages.
Oh my God. One of the things that I really appreciated about talking with you is just how much I learn about different outside perspectives that are not American. I'm trying to, and I have slowly but surely, trying to unAmericanize, my brain and my thought process.
Being totally immersed in a language is terrifying, especially because French people can be so mean. The people in Paris are so mean. Everyone is collectively always having a bad day in Paris. Like it's never a good day in Paris. Everyone talks really fast, and they mumble. So it kind of shock forces you into picking up French, hearing it, and training your ear to hear French.
But it’s hard, though, cause even the rest of the world thinks in an American-centric way. Cause I find that even like in Singapore, you’re still kind of thinking in this like America centric way. A main thing about it is that all our media comes out of Hollywood. All our media is very Americanized. It’s those kinds of small things. It’s like, even when you step out, do you really step out?
That's funny because I started off learning French. Then when I started learning Spanish my French said good day. Then when I started studying Japanese, my Japanese was like good day Spanish.
They do say to really learn the language you need to immerse yourself in the culture. You need to be thrown in and nobody can speak English to you. Have you encountered queer culture in France?
Listen, I don't know. So, you been living in France now for a while. You have to learn the language. How have you been able to live and do and get by and what seems to be a whole other culture
Not really. I think mainly because I don't have a lot of French friends. It's difficult to make friends with French people when you speak no French. I’m captain of the LGBT Society at my campus. It’s not a big LGBT Society though. [laughs]
I really like languages. It’s something I'm very interested in. Not to suck my own dick or something, but I've always been good at it.
Well, how the hell you do that? [laughs]
Talk yo shit. [laughs] [laughs] It's always been something that I enjoy. After I was seven, I picked up Chinese fast, the Singaporean version of Chinese, which is Chinese mixed with English, where people switch back and forth. Then I switched to Spanish. That was really fun. That was the first time I had learned a new language because I taught myself Japanese. [laughs] I learned Spanish with the intention, I was like, I'm going to return to the U.S. for college. I didn't know that I was going to France for college six months before I went to college. Then I got to France, and it was so hard for me to switch as well.
It’s not a long story. [laughs] I applied and got the position. But I have to hand it down next year since I won’t be on campus. We don’t get to much because of COVID, but we’re supposed to put on a drag show. And I’m living for it. So, you’re a world traveler. You go from the U.S. to Singapore, to Japan, to France and all these other places. What is it about traveling that you enjoy? You gave an answer last time and I'm wondering has that answer changed now that you have a mature.
I identify as aroace now." talking about identity
What I like is the things that you see. I like buildings. [laughs] I draw buildings in my free time as a hobby. I just think that it's so interesting how the architecture changes from country to country. In Singapore, we have these government housing, but they're very rectangular apartment blocks. They're very modern. Then you come to Europe, and you have all these old buildings, old roads, and old streets. I have a film camera that I've been shooting on. All the photos I sent you from my travels were taken on that film camera. I like film and like to take my traveling photos on film because I feel like film has this slow feeling. They feel still. I like that cause I live a very fast life, so it's nice to look at these and be like they look calm. You answered this almost the exact same way as last time. But what just came to my mind suddenly is how hilarious it is that I have this connection with you now. I'm so excited to see what you do next. I'm two and a half years away from graduating from college. Now I'm obligated two years from now to give you a graduation present. I'm excited because I don't talk to a lot of y'all from Georgetown. I feel like some of the staff and other students who follow me from Georgetown will be pretty interested to see what’s happening with you. Wow. [laughs] That's just that's so weird to think that happened so long ago. It just feels like it wasn't that long ago. Time is passing so fast. So, thank you again for sitting down with me and for letting me see your now maturing face. We'll keep in contact because you are hilarious, and I just appreciate you. You teach me so much. Thank you. And hopefully you will be able to come out to Asia next year cause I will definitely be in Asia. I'm not sure where. I might stay in Singapore with my parents. I might be going ahead to Japan. I will be in Asia, so if you do make it out, please let me know.
You will hear from me. [laughs] I’ll say I’m in the Asian part of the world! I'm here, what do I have to do? Please come translate these things for me. It will be cool. And maybe we could eat [laughs] That would be so cool. I'm going to let you go. I know it’s like two in the morning where you are. And now I'm really going to find me something to eat because I am starving. Wow. Also, sorry. This is a bit of a weird question. I'm looking back at my article right now. Can we delete it? [laughs] It's like, when you like post shit of yourself when you're 14 and you're like, oh my God, I can't. [laughs] What do you mean!! This is history we cannot delete it. It’s already printed. This is one of those moments where you’re thinking too hard. Don't even worry about it. The category is growth and evolution. Consider this like a time capsule in a sense. As you move forward, you can look back and reflect on who you were and how you’ve evolved overtime. And you know, you say that you’ve been published twice now, bitches. [laughs] [laughs] Okay. Alright. [laughs] Thank you so much. [laughs]
PUBLISHED IN FLINT, MICHIGAN
VOL. XIII-2 | MAR '22
GABY
THE MODERN QUEER