Tel Aviv: The New Gay Travel Hotspot
Last summer, Scott Perlmutter, a 44-year-old gay TV executive from Los Angeles, went on a 10-day vacation to Mykonos—a tiny, gay-friendly island off the coast of Greece. Among the dizzying array of skimpy Speedos, ridiculously fit men, and breathtaking sunsets, Perlmutter was so high on life, he had to look down to see heaven.
Like many of his gay friends, Perlmutter is a travel fanatic. His yearly trips are carefully planned months in advance and include a mixture of fun and culture. In just the last few years, he’s been to Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, Amsterdam, and Berlin. He’s even gone on a lavish gay cruise to Italy.
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Gay Fathers in Israel, in Real Life and in Sitcoms
ON weeknights at the Gay Center here, a four-story building in the heart of the city, parking a stroller is about as hard as parking a car elsewhere in town, which is to say, nearly impossible. The tyke-sized traffic jam is one indication of the gay baby boom that has taken place across Israel, in the last several years.
“A kid last week said to another kid, ‘I have two moms,’ ” recalled Idan Netzer, who oversees the center’s preschool, which opened in November. “And the other kid said: ‘So what? Daniel in my kindergarten has two moms too.’ ”
It’s been a big year for gay parents in Israel. In May a committee of the Health Ministry recommended that surrogacy be allowed for gay men. (Currently they can only travel abroad for that option.) A month later organizers of Tel Aviv Pride, one of the city’s largest annual events, splashed images of two real-life gay fathers and their children on publicity materials and a banner next to Town Hall, making them the faces of the festivities.
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Tel Aviv at the top ten “Ultimate Dream Cities”
GayCities concluded another annual Best of GayCities campaign by revealing the top travel destinations. The interactive campaign had thousands of GayCities members and readers creating “ultimate dream” travel itineraries by mapping their favorite cities.
Paris was the most selected city overall, and also the top city in two categories: “Romance City” and “Food & Wine City.” New York City came in strong second, nabbing the title of “City That Never Sleeps.”
Rounding out the top 10 “ultimate dream” cities are:
Tel Aviv, San Francisco, Provincetown, Rome, Rio de Janeiro, Sydney, Barcelona, London
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Tel Aviv gets set for first pride run
Tel Aviv’s annual marathon has grown to become the country’s largest sporting event – over 30,000 runners are expected to take part in the 2013 event that will be held on 15 March.
One of the features of the Tel Aviv marathon is the multiple courses included in the event which maximizes participation – the 2013 event will include a full marathon, half marathon, 10km, 4.2km, 420m race for children, inline skating, and a hand-cycle race. In addition the city will mark the event with a major sporting and cultural festival.
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Gay Israeli Chef Gil Hovav Speaks OUT
In this exclusive audio interview Emmy Winner Charlotte Robinson host of OUTTAKE VOICES™ talks with Gil Hovav, Israel’s leading culinary journalist and television personality. Gil was recently in Boston in celebration of “Out In Israel Month” a program to educate about the status of civil rights for LGBT Israeli citizens and exchange ideas about our LGBT community in both Israel and Massachusetts. We talked to Hovav about this, LGBT issues, his newest cookbook “Confessions of a Kitchen Rebbetzin” and his spin on the current Gaza conflict.
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Gay Men In The Promised Land
When many people think of Israel, it is often in terms of modern war or ancient religion. But there is much more to the Jewish state than missiles and prayers. In his debut as a documentary filmmaker, adult-film entrepreneur and political columnist Michael Lucas examines a side of Israel that is too often overlooked: its thriving gay community. Undressing Israel features interviews with a diverse range of local men, including a gay member of Israel’s parliament, a trainer who served openly in the army, a young Arab-Israeli journalist, and a pair of dads raising their kids. Lucas also visits Tel Aviv’s vibrant nightlife scene—and even attends a same-sex wedding—in this guided tour to a country that has emerged as a pioneer for gay integration and equality.
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Israeli pop star Harel Skaat comes to UMass
Israel pop star Harel Skaat visited the University of Massachusetts’ Hillel HouseOct. 28 to lead a discussion about the LGBT life in Israel and about being an openly gay celebrity.
The singer started an open dialogue with the audience, discussing in general the current condition of LGBT life rights, such as the lack of legal recognition of same-sex couples in Israel and other parts of the world.
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Tel Aviv named world’s best gay city
Tel Aviv has been named the Best Gay City of 2011 in an international American Airlines competition selecting the most popular destinations among LGTB tourists.
The Israeli metropolis won 43% of the votes, leaving New York City behind in the second place with only 14% of the votes.
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Welcome Back to the Disco Days
It wasn’t too long ago when listening to ABBA, watching Gossip Girl and adoring Meryl Streep were considered “enough” to be gay. With your best girlfriend on one arm, and a Prada bag on the other, you knew you were a part of “the family.” Today, however, it seems that the definition of being gay includes having a political agenda and motive. There is nothing wrong with this notion of politically charged movements, but somewhere along the way, we lost all the fun in just being gay. We lost the glitter, the musicals and the shine to the now socially mandated divestments and pinkwashings. Thank God we didn’t lose our sense of style.
The color pink has been all over the news in the past year. Not because it was the hottest color of the Milan or Paris fashion shows, but because of the new term that was introduced to the media: Pinkwashing. The term was first established by breast cancer organizations to describe the activities of companies and groups leading the struggle to eradicate the disease. Later, the term was adopted by LGBT and other civil movements to describe the strategy of concealing the possible violations of Palestinian rights behind an image of modernity signified by Israeli gay life. However, the two topics are completely separate and there is no need to address both in the same context, as they pertain to different issues in Israeli life today.
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