Homo for the holiday – at sea

• Source: Global Times
• [23:09 February 21 2010]
• Comments

The Atlantis Events cruise boat. Photo: mattyee.com

By Michael Gold

It's Queer as Folk meets The Love Boat in the Far East as Atlantis Events, a California-based travel and events company who bill themselves as "the leader in all-gay vacations," launch their first East-Asia open-ocean cruise from Shanghai to Hong Kong on March 20. In part a reflection of Shanghai's increased openness toward homosexuality – the city was the first in China to host a gay-pride week in June 2009 – the 10- day cruise also includes stops in South Korea and Japan before making its final port of call in Hong Kong.

"Our business is to provide a fun, high quality vacation experience for our gay and lesbian guests," said Atlantis PR Stephan Roth, who maintains that Atlantis does not have a political or gay rights agenda and that the decision to compile an itinerary that includes China was simply a result of "this growing interest in Asia among our guests, and the attractiveness of exciting East Asian destinations such as Shanghai."

Also a major factor in the decision was the popularity of their 2009 Southeast Asia cruise, the first all-gay cruise in these waters, which connected Hong Kong to Singapore via ports in Vietnam and Thailand and is this year offered in combination with the Shanghai to Hong Kong tour. "[That tour] sold out in record time, and many guests said it was the best cruise they had ever taken," said Roth.

As gay-themed vacations grow in popularity the world over, business ventures seeking to harness the economic potential of gay tourism are emerging in ways that would have been unthinkable only a few years ago. Nepal, for example, is set to legalize gay marriage when it ratifies a new constitution in May and will offer gay weddings and vacation packages on Mt. Qomolangma ( Mt. Everest), ac-cording to the UK's Daily Telegraph.

The road in China remains rocky, however, as evidenced by last month's cancellation of the Mr Gay China pageant in Beijing. Roth holds that Atlantis Events is "not in a position to comment on the attitudes towards gay people in China" and claims that all their Shanghai-based hotel partners have been welcoming and supportive. "Our experience has been that the citizens and businesspeople of the communities that we have visited around the world have generally welcomed us to their ports, even in more socially and politically conservative countries," he said.

Roth also claims that Atlantis welcomes clients from the world over, including China. The reaction among the Shanghai gay community, however, has been mixed. "I think it's definitely a good thing in general," said Hou Lam, an Australian expat working in Shanghai, "but it's too expensive for regular Chinese people, and too hard for them to get visas to visit these other countries."

Xing Zhao, a freelance writer and author of LGBeaT, a gay-themed column for City Weekend Shanghai, told the Global Times that while the city's gay community might see an economic boost from the cruise, "it's not advertised here, so I don't think many Chinese people will be getting on board."