Essere gay e rom è possibile?

Article by Rebecca Erken published on Zeit Online (Germany) on 9 July 2015, freely translated by Marco Galvagno

When Gianni (Jovanovic) lived in Cologne (Germany), he had a wife and two children, before coming out, he now fights with his organization Queer Roma against homophobia and racism.
During the gay pride celebration in Cologne we were surprised by the presence of a new float: a group of people paraded with a Roma flag and the writing "Queer Roma" and behind the flag they carried a sign with the writing "love". Their leader is Gianni Jovanic who today shows himself proud, because he had to carry a double face all his life, he hid from people outside his group that he was Roma, but not even in his Roma community could he say that he was gay, nor to his parents, nor his wife.
“Coming out was the hardest thing in my life, but also the most important.” Gianni recently began to make his life public through a YouTube channel.

“I tell everything for those who want to listen to me. There are very few visible Roma gays and even fewer who publicly declare their sexual orientation. I decided to speak out, instead of staying silent for fear of double discrimination and so last spring the Queer Roma organization was born even though I come from an extremely traditional family."
At fourteen he got married to a girl, it was fine for him at the time. At sixteen he and his wife had their first child, and a year and a half later their second was born. At eighteen she realized that she actually loved men.

Six years must have passed…

So he spent six years repressing his tendencies. “I had a huge responsibility towards my wife and children, I didn't want to disappoint them.” At such a young age he was afraid of jeopardizing everything, his parents and his job to support the family. For his family it was a taboo, a tragedy, but in the end they welcomed him, accepted his life and his wife is still part of the family. "I get along well with my children and my grandchildren. At 37, I'm already a grandfather."
He is very familiar with both homophobia and racism. “I have experienced both homophobia and racism.” Gianni Jovanovic was born in Russelheim and grew up in various German cities including Nuremberg and Darmstadt. He has great oratory skills, greater than those of many politicians.
She has lived for eleven years with her partner with whom she founded an association. A few days before the gay pride in Cologne he spoke about his life at the LGTBIQ support and assistance center (Beratungzentrum Rubicon). Hundreds of people were there to listen to him and applaud him.
“The minority within the minority has defeated the majority.” A woman sitting in the front row approaches and hugs him together with her children. “My story cannot be generalized” says Jovanic. “The Roma population is estimated at approximately 12,000 people, but we cannot define it as a homogeneous group. Some live in Bavaria and others in the Rhineland, there are more than sixty dialects in the Romani language and many different faiths.”

A scar on his head

Jovanovic was a child with an innate predisposition for languages, he had been sent to kindergarten in a school for children with special needs. It was there that the teacher made sure he attended school regularly. The family tried in every way to settle in one place.

“There wasn't a single place where we were welcomed.” He tells us about the barracks in which he had to live with his parents, because there were no houses to rent for the nomads. He still has a scar on his head commemorating the day a stone hit his head while his shack was set on fire by a Molotov cocktail.

“Has the situation changed since then?” Very little. I have seen how even my own grandchildren face this stigma. Eighty or ninety percent of Roma boys and girls are sent to special education schools. Many have been forced to hide their true identity and pretend to be Serbs in order to overcome the situation. The Germans don't know the living conditions of the Roma, they don't have the faintest idea. “

Jovanovic is now a small business owner and has lived in Cologne for years. He tells us the doubts that have always accompanied him and asks himself, a little frowning, “Why am I Roma?, why am I gay? Is being Roma and gay possible?”. Then he tells us the first paragraph of the fundamental gay laws of Cologne "You are as you are"

Original text: Roma und schwul, geht das überhaupt?