Q&A with Danny Ramadan who was part of the first gay Syrian couple to arrive in Canada

Danny Ramadan is a gay man who was born and raised in Damascus, Syria, a country where homosexuality, which is illegal, is punishable by imprisonment of up to three years.

The 32-year-old left his family’s home when he was a teenager. He says he came out to his father at 17 during an argument they were having one day.

“They didn’t take it very well,” is how Ramadan put it. He left Syria the following year, immigrating to Egypt, where he began working as a journalist.

He lived in Cairo for seven years before returning to Syria in 2011 when the political unrest in the country was picking up steam and eventually forced the displacement of millions of citizens. At that time, he began working with a friend to create a safe space for the LGBTQ community in Damascus.

That’s when things began to unravel.

After finding out about Ramadan’s journalistic and civil rights work, the Syrian government arrested him in 2012 for running the LGBTQ centre in Damascus. He spent a week in prison before he was released, fleeing to Lebanon.

“I have a hard time remembering that period of time from my life,” he said, having suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder after being jailed.

He and his then-partner were the first gay Syrian couple to come to Canada in 2014. A lot has changed for Ramadan since arriving in Vancouver that year.

Ramadan spoke to Yahoo Canada News about his journey from Syria and his transition to a Canadian culture.

Q: Tell me about the work you did in the Middle East.

My friend and I turned my apartment in Damascus into this makeshift underground LGBTQ centre. We had a password for entry and a system set up so that we only invited people who we trusted.

We had 150 people who knew about the centre and that’s around the time I got arrested.

I was also working for the Guardian and NPR on the Gay Girl in Damascus story. There was a blogger who was reporting about the uprising in Syria. The blogger claimed she was arrested so I started investigating the matter. I ended up discovering that she didn’t exist and it was actually an American man living in Scotland who was writing her posts. The work I was doing basically outed me.

Q: What happened after you got arrested?

My friends helped get me out of jail and I had to leave the country overnight to Lebanon.

I stayed in Lebanon for two years. During that period, I applied to be a privately sponsored refugee with a group of sponsors in Canada. In 2014, my ex-partner and me became the first gay couple to arrive in Canada from Syria.

Q: What was it like when you arrived in Canada?

We struggled a lot in the first six months of our arrival, adjusting to the new culture and I had a lot of post-traumatic stress disorder to deal with.

We struggled finding work and faced prejudice. There was a lot of push back from our side about our self determination, our privacy and our boundaries to a lot of people who came to us with a good heart and who just wanted to help but ended up infringing on our privacy and depicting us as helpless Syrian refugees rather than the human beings that we are.

Q: What do you do in Vancouver?

After seven months in Vancouver, I started doing public speaking and that led to more opportunities. I work as a volunteer co-ordinator at Qmunity. It’s an LGBTQ centre, similar to the 519 in Toronto.

Given that I am out of the closet, I have tons of LBGTQ connections back home.

I get folks who are refugees to be sponsored here to Canada with the help of a local organization called Rainbow Refugee. At the moment we have 15 circles that are sponsoring 20 LGBTQ identified folks from Syria.

Q: What struggles do LGBTQ refugees waiting to come to Canada face?

Two lesbian women that I sponsored personally with six other Canadians who helped me raise the funds are arriving, hopefully, any day.

They got the approval; they went to the interview and did their medical testing. The only thing that’s missing right now is for the embassy to call them and tell them, let’s stamp your passports.

We’ve been waiting for that phone call for the past six weeks now. We don’t understand what the hold up is. I’ll pay for their tickets for them to come here. We have enough money to cover their expenses for the first year of their arrival.

Q: Did you have a similar experience in terms of waiting?

Yes. We started the process of planning to come to Canada in 2011.

We found our sponsors in June 2013. We applied in July 2013 and we got our interview in June 2014. Then we had to wait till September to get a visa.

Q: Do you remember how you felt when you found out you’re coming to Canada?

I always knew that the Middle East was not the place for me. That if I continued living there, I would never find safety or stability. I lived in crisis mode throughout my life.

When I heard that I got the stamp of approval, I felt safe for the very first time in my life. It just felt relaxing. I didn’t realize that I would come here and end up facing a lot of issues but back then there was a sense of a safety I finally felt.

Q: What was the cultural shift like for you?

It actually allowed me to flourish in a way.

There’s slight racism that happens when everybody is asking you where you are from. As someone who looks different and has an accent, I stand out. However, I took it as a positive thing because it allowed for me to push for the causes I care for.

The experience of emigrating from one place to another changes you in so many different ways. I saw that in my ex-partner. He became more mature from a financial point of view and became focused on his job and life in a completely different way where as I became more outgoing.

Moving from that culture to this culture allowed for my real personality to flourish. I’m not worried about being gay 24/7 and being punished for my sexuality. That took so much energy from me that I couldn’t focus on being myself.

Now that I’m here I’m becoming the man I wanted to become, which is beautiful, I think.

Q: What are your plans for the future?

I finished my novel and there are a few publishers that are interested. I am hoping to continue working in the non-profit, specifically more work with refugees. I hope to move to Toronto one day.

One day I hope all those refugees from Syria can work together to start a satellite LGBTQ organization for Syrians in Canada.

Maybe one day in my lifetime, maybe not, I hope I can bring LGBTQ rights to Syria. Maybe do a pride parade in Damascus but that would be a very far-fetched dream but here’s to hoping.

All images via Facebook

The interview was condensed and edited.