SYDNEY: A shopping initiative on Oxford Street featuring fitness gurus, massages and drag shows is enticing locals to rediscover the gay mile during the Mardi Gras season. 

Risking violence and imprisonment, Sergey Yenin and other queer activists from GayBelarus push forward to present the country’s first public gay pride event. Australian documentarian Logan Mucha captures their courageous journey in the new documentary East Bloc Love.

Maeve Marsden and Maya Newell both have two mums. As part of the Mardi Gras ‘Queer Thinking’ program they are presenting Growing up Other: Adult children of same-sex parents speak. Along with other ‘gaybies’, Marsden and Newell will discuss sperm donors, school bullies, siblings, privacy, the power of language and the meaning of ‘family’. They spoke to CHERRIE about the forum and about growing up in ‘culturally queer families’.

With yet another busy year shaping up ahead of us, it’s time for me to unwind for a few weeks, soak the bunions in onsens, channel my inner geisha and curl up with a good book – in between rigorous training in slalom for the London Olympic. My dear petals, by the time you read this, if I have not been impregnated by aliens again then I’ll already have my leg in the air, clipping my toe nails and relaxing on the slopes at Hakuba, one of Japan’s finest ski fields.

Protests, tantrums, monsters and a historic policy shift at the ALP National Conference – SX looks back on the year that was for LGBTI Sydney. 

After a year filled with so many highlights I thought I’d share my Most Memorable Mayngey Moments of 2011.

US drag star RuPaul, in Sydney in March 2012m for the new dance event, Glamazon, will make a guest appearance at the Mardi Gras Party. She joins SX columnist Trevor Ashley as two top acts to look out for at next year's Mardi Gras Festival.

The ILGA Asia-Pacific Conference is heading to Sydney next year as a formal part of the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Festival.

Many of you enjoy going off the rails at Mardi Gras, but this year you can go on the rails.

Dear blaze readers, we’ve returned from our little Sydney-Melbourne jaunt. Being quintessentially Adelaidean, I’m shy when visiting ‘the big smokes’ and didn’t make a physical manifestation. But there’s no doubt about it, ‘big town is fun’!

After reading that award-winning gay writer and Independent columnist Johann Hari has admitted to plagiarising a slew of the interviews that led to his success, I had to realise I have a skewed set of morals. Many professional transgressions bother me, such as embezzelemt, insider trading and nepotism. However, I don't really have a visceral reaction to them.

It’s no secret that over the last decade, the major dance parties that were once so successful have suffered from a massive decline in interest.

Sydney’s LGBTI community is being urged to reclaim Oxford Street’s golden mile next month, with the first ever Big Gay Weekend fast approaching.