Mamahalin Mo Ba Ako?

ZAMBOANGA CITY (Mindanao Examiner / Feb. 15, 2009) “40 ang waist line ko. Mamahalin mo ba ako? Babae ako. Bakla ka. Mamahalin mo ba ako? Lalake ka. Lalake rin ako. May pag-asa bang mahalin mo ako?”

These were the words that opened the Valentines Special of the Gender Café held last February 13 at Gallery of the Peninsula and Archipelago in Ateneo de Zamboanga University.

The Gender Café is an annual event facilitated by the Gender and Development Program and the Gender Task Force under the Social Awareness and Community Service Involvement (SACSI) office of the university. It is an affair that engages faculty and students to understanding and to the promotion of gender sensitivity and gender equality.

Normally, the Gender Café is held on September or on the Women’s month. Brian Bango, program officer for Gender and Development and the student volunteers of the Gender Task Force, however, felt that moving the Café to February as a Valentines special would best soothe the goals of the program.

The theme of the café was “Mamahalin mo ba ako?” This made the café focus on the different feelings of love from the different genders.

Poetry reading was the main attraction of the show accompanied with a several love songs all given by the students. After each poem, the reader asked questions about the extremes of love that obviously struck the audience.

Some realizations on how women, men, gays, lesbians, metrosexuals, bisexuals and transgendered felt and thought about love were also given through the poems, songs and speeches.

In the end, the audience, faculty, program officers and volunteers agreed to the words of Bango in his speech, “babae, lalake, bakla, tomboy, bisexual, transgendered ka man, may karapatan kang magmahal.”

The Gender Café then did not only make everyone present feel the love three hours before Valentines Day itself but also made everybody else realize that Valentines is not only for girls and boys in a relationship but for every human person no matter what their gender choice and sexual preference is.(Michelle Angela Araneta)