Black gay club kampala, uganda

This is the second in a series of articles from Uganda by Xtra freelance reporter Kaj Hasselriis. Every major city in the world has a gay hangout — a place for queers to meet, drink and cruise. First, I found a gay dating site where a few dozen guys in Uganda have profiles — none with photos. I created my own ad.

On a Sunday night in , year-old Mark was dancing at Ram Bar, a gay bar in Kampala. He raised his hands and swayed his hips to the music of Sheebah Karungi. Earlier that day, Mark was doing the same thing but to different music, for a different audience and with a different motive - he was praising God at church. For the longest time, Mark knew who he was: a queer Christian.

Just as he attends church on Sunday morning, there's another sacred place Nick, a year-old Kampala stylist, flocks to every Sunday night. It's a beautiful Sunday. But for six hours on a Sunday night that fly by all too fast, the venue, with its grass thatched roof and flashing fluorescent disco floor lights, becomes a haven for Uganda's gay community who meet here to drink, dance and more. This normally happens from about midnight.

While investigators in the central African nation have claimed the arrests of people at the underground RAM bar followed reports of shisha and opium smoking, rights groups have claimed the raid was an assault on the community amid increasing pressure against sexual minorities. They were having fun, listening to music. Then you arrest almost and charge them with being a public nuisance. Activists have said the situation in the country has worsened since last month when MPs pushed for new laws to make homosexual acts punishable by death.