Bóng

The two most common words for gay in Vietnamese are the French-derived "pede", with it's obvious implications, and "bóng".

Traditionally bóng are a kind of transvestite mystic, embodying the secret powers of both sexes. They'd linger about the temples and pagodas. They tell your future, tell you things about yourself you don't yet know. They're with you there, silently, when go to light the incense, and they're with you there, singing, at your funeral when you go. They live at the fringe, the periphery - where things start to become fuzzy - mysterious, sacred, dangerous, dirty.

"This is always what I think of when people shout at me on the streets. 'Yes', I say. 'I am - and so?', and then they feel sort of bad."

Jaydee fixes his hat and has another sip of his iced latte. "Bóng can also mean 'glossy'". He taps his PDA with a shiny, press-on nail. "I like that".

Jaydee left the house at 16 to open a fashion boutique. His family is well respected after all, and he couldn't burden them with such a life. He would work through the night sewing to keep up demand but struggled, and the shop eventually closed. He took the opportunity to study abroad in Seattle where he met his boyfriend-cum-fiancee.

It was there that his mother warmed to the idea that two men could form a couple, watching the way John would dote on him. And when the two moved back to Vietnam to (symbolically) marry, his parents were hesitantly, silently approving.

In the rip-roaring frenzy of 21st century Saigon, a stable marriage is just about every parent's hope for their child - and at the age of twenty, miraculous.