Dressing to win

Denjan, who was born and raised in an army barracks, says he’s preferred the female way of living for as long as he can remember.

“I guess I was born to be a transvestite. My environment and the way my family tried to raise me to become a man didn’t affect me at all. I knew very early that I didn’t want to do boy’s things like play football with the soldiers who were my father’s subordinates at the army barracks in Nan. I liked sewing and playing with dolls,” says the 23-year-old graduate with a gentle smile.

“I used to scream like a girl when I was a toddler too,” he adds.

Denjan feels he has been very lucky, explaining that his parents gradually came to understand that they had a transgender child and finally accepted him as he is.

“I didn’t have to hide my female-like behaviour and tell them what I wanted to be. My parents understood me when I was a child,” he says. “I had friends who liked dressing as girls or who I knew were gay in the barracks but none of them dared confide in their parents. They were scared their families couldn’t accept it and that their preferences would cause a problem. Some of them are still keeping their homosexuality a secret today.”

His family’s support was particularly important during his school years when taunts from classmates often reduced the youngster to tears.

“If parents do not accept what their children are, they have nowhere to turn. They won’t have the courage to go on and improve themselves,” he says.

Denjan recalls trying on his mother’s clothes and using her cosmetics while at primary school but says he didn’t start dressing as a girl until his first year at Thammasat. “And I haven’t cut my hair since!”

He’s currently working for the public relations department of Siam Samsung Life Insurance and also sell policies for the company. While he enjoys his job, he senses that customers are less at ease with a transgender. “They do not trust me as much as the male and female agents. I need to try harder all the time.”

Denjan feels both the public and private sectors should open their doors to transvestites and transgenders. “They should consider our capabilities rather than our characteristics,” Denjan said.

He has yet to undergo a sex change operation but will soon have his hair cut, as he wants to be ordained to show his gratitude to his beloved grandmother and parents. He would rather become a nun but accepts that Buddhist religious regulations, he will probably have to serve in a monastery.

Denjan’s fight to dress as a woman for the graduation ceremony was his first but he doubts it will be the last. “We just want the same rights as others and want people to treat us as human beings. I’m glad that my case has drawn people’s attention and opened discussion. This is good even though opinions are very mixed.”

He cites as his role models Yollada Krerkkong Suanyot, the transgender beauty queen who is president of the Trans Female Association of Thailand and also a member of the Nan Provincial Administrative Organisation and Jim Sarah, a transsexual singer who won the fight is use the title of Ms and went on to marry a Thai man.

Denjan is planning to start work soon for a doctoral degree in social science and intends to use the knowledge he gains to serve others. He’s also saving up for a sex change operation and is hoping to earn the right to call himself Ms too. 

But for now he’s concentrating on taking care of his grandmother, parents and his pregnant elder sister. 

“I will also help my sister raise her child. I’ll be a second mum,” says Denjan with a big smile.