Sefanaia Waqabaca is a ‘feminine’ or ‘gay’. A hair stylist in one of Suva city’s most frequented hair salons, he’s not hiding the fact that he is. “Not a problem! Shoot, I’m very open,” he reassures me of my asking if he doesn’t mind being asked personal questions about his lifestyle. With his short styled bleached blonde hair, jeans, tee-shirt and a scarf, Sefa (as he prefers to be called with due respect to his namesake) says he wouldn’t be caught dead in a skirt or dress for that matter. And he doesn”t go by some chic nickname either.

Tall, slim, humble and always polite, he describes himself and others like him “feminine”. Feminine in the sense that he walks, speaks and acts like a woman. Sefa says he always felt girlish as he was growing up. “Even though it was something new to me, I felt comfortable about it. To me, it was a case of ‘follow your heart.’ I take my lifestyle seriously. It’s not some experimental game I’m playing or whatever – it’s something I treasure, it’s not vakasabusabu kind-of-stuff. I was feminine while in school – I did play rugby once in secondary school, but I was more into volleyball, but that didn’t mean I did not mingle with the guys in school.

Sefa grew up with family and relatives who were in the military. He was respectful of others and his elders and mindful of his actions around them. And contrary to people’s beliefs, “I don’t lust after every guy I see. Being gay is something that I treasure, I don’t throw myself around. I prefer a stable long term relationship with a partner,” he says.

Full Story from the Fiji Times Online

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