the arabic title of the collection of gay travel stories edited by michael lungo is: "رحلات شاذ إلى العالم الإسلامي"/ lit: "freak travels to the islamic world." it is published by the arab duffision company, a publisher based out of beirut, lebanon. it should be noted that the word "sh`dt" actually is the equivalent of "queer," and is the one that is mostly used in the arab world to describe queer people.oddly enough, i was reading a story from syria before i read the article from advocate (see: book translation: "gay" equals "pervert"). the article from syria had a title that says; "anaa sh`dt"... or "i'm queer". and it dealt with the story of a gay man who is definitely like many young gay arabs who refuse to face the music (the story, from the state owned syrian news, can be found here: anaa sh`dt). therefore, this is a widely used word.
i would have rather they used the word "مثلي"/"mithlee", which literally means "same" (i.e, same-sex). but it is so nice that there is an arabic translation to this great book that one might even overlook the crude word. i would be more interested to know what the content of the book itself is like... rather than the title, though.
- afdhere jama
the huriyah editor
