Village South Vietnam and Gay Weddings Keeps the Town Talking

Two men publicly tying the knot nearly two weeks ago in the southern province of Kien Giang in Vietnam have remained a hot topic among local townspeople.

At noon of May 16, Truong Van Hen and Nguyen Hoang Bao Quoc held a large-scale wedding in Ha Tien with hundreds of guests, reported VietNamNet.

Thousands of curious people were said to have surrounded the wedding, jamming the traffic. Some tried to stop or protest the wedding, but were dismissed by the local authorities.

The Vietnam Law on Marriage and Family bans marriage between people of same same sex but the union is supported by the two families.

Many websites have circulated pictures of how parents, relatives, friends and guests witnessed ‘Groom’ Bao Quoc, dressed in a white suit, clink glasses of champagne with his ‘bride’ Van Hen, who wore red.

The first public gay marriage in the country was reported in 2007. The couple, Dinh Cong Khanh and Nguyen Thai Nguyen, now lives in Canada, where gay marriage is recognized.

According to an earlier survey by the STDs/HIV/AIDS Prevention Center (SHAPC), the Vietnamese saw homosexuality in a broadly negative light. Up to 36 percent of interviewees saw homosexuality as social evil, and 68 percent as a disease. Nearly half saw it as unhealthy relations, 27 percent corrupted and 56 percent unnatural.

Story obtained by  BY DEREK YIU