Virus pushes transgender dancers out of homes

Closure of wedding halls, scrapped celebrations have frozen their income sources

ISLAMABAD: Before the virus shutdown, dancer Adnan Ali had carved out a comfortable living performing at parties for newlyweds and newborns, avoiding the financial hardship faced by many in Pakistan's transgender community.

But the closure of wedding halls and scrapped celebrations where she would twist and twirl in front of applauding crowds have frozen her income, forcing her out of the one-bedroom apartment she rented in a wealthy suburb of Islamabad.

Now she shares a cramped single room in a shelter with other transgender dancers who have also lost work because of a nationwide lockdown triggered by the pandemic.

"I want to return to a routine again, to dance again and to do something good in my life," said Ali, sitting barefoot on the steps of the house in Pakistan's capital.

Pakistan became one of the first countries in the world to legally recognise the third sex in 2009 and began issuing transgender passports from 2017. Several have also run in elections.

Outside the joy of dancing, life for 26-year-old Mena Gul has always felt like a form of self-isolation.

"We have been quarantined for our entire life, we cannot go outside and we hide our faces whenever we leave our homes," she told AFP, her wardrobe of dazzling dresses neglected.

While Pakistan has relaxed its shutdown of businesses, even as a record number of new cases are reported on a near-daily basis, wedding halls have not been allowed to reopen.

Over the past few months the shelter, which once helped around a dozen transgender people, has bulged to offer food to more than 70, supported by local donations.

The few rooms it offers were quickly filled, with some sleeping on the floor to maximise space.

Make-up artist Nadeem Kashish, who founded the shelter, has had to turn many people away. On the street outside, dozens pushed out of work beg passers-by for food. Dancing is a way of avoiding a life of begging or sex work for many in the marginalised transgender community, believed to number hundreds of thousands in Pakistan according to studies by non-profit groups and development organisations.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 22^nd, 2020.