Aussie Transgender Story

This is far from a new story. In fact it is from 2010 but it bears revisiting.

It actually came from "AsiaOne's" Diva site for women and features Ms Chelsey Mikimoto who was born in Singapore to a Malay-Dutch mother and a Chinese- Japanese father. She migrated with her family to Australia in the mid-90s at age 10.

Much of her story sounds familiar: "Although born biologically male, Ms Mikimoto said that she never identified with being one. Growing up, she liked girlie things. She dreamed of parading in beautiful gowns and experimented with her mother's make-up and clothes. One Christmas, she placed her name on the Barbie doll meant for a female cousin.
 She had visited a psychiatrist who diagnosed her with gender identity dysphoria - a condition in which individuals identify emotionally and psychologically with the other gender. For five years before the surgery, she lived as a woman. During that time, she underwent hormone replacement therapy to feminise her facial and bodily features. Other than physical changes, she also took the time to "greatly reflect" on what it meant to have the gender change."

I haven't been able to find much recent information on her, so I hope all is well!

Cross Dressing Rocket Man

Over the past several months I have featured pictures and more here in Cyrsti's Condo from a Japanese site called Rocket News24. 

Recently they ran a long and detailed post called "16 Things I Learned from Dressing in Drag". Confessions of a one night crossdresser.

The post in itself just tells most of us transgender or even genetic women what we already know such as lesson #10:

 It’s more than just the clothes You might think that getting feminine airs is as easy as putting on a dress and a wig, but it turns out there’s a lot more to it. Even something as simple as the word “I” is different from males to females in Japanese, so I had to constantly think about how to refer to myself. Or sometimes, I would sit down in what I thought was a ladylike way, only to find my knees popping open. Or my walk would get very bowlegged if I wasn’t paying attention. There’s just so much to think about! Femininity is hard.

Or the final lesson #16:

Dressing as a woman was unexpectedly intoxicating, but I couldn’t stay like that forever. Going back to my usual self was kind of sad, though. I took off the makeup, removed the wig, traded my dress for my usual men’s clothes, and thought, “Well, that’s that.” It was rather dreary to look in the mirror and find the usual boring face reflected back at me. I almost wanted to cry. So if on the street one night you should happen to meet a man in drag, so long as he isn’t doing anything bad, please just let him be.

If you haven't been to the Rocket News 24 site it's worth the time to check it out!

Brazilian Transgender Model

The six foot tall Felipa Tavares has emerged as another of  Brazil’s small but growing ranks of transgender models . The leggy, high-cheekboned sirens who were born men but are causing a splash in Brazil and other international fashion capitals around the world.

One of the positives of models such as Felipa's emergence is the sense of softening of homo and transphobic attitudes in countries such as Brazil!

She recently made the Celebrity section of the Washington Post and of course you can read it here.