Hong Kong Pride Parade to host indoor bazaar next month

Hong Kong Pride Parade will host an indoor market in November, featuring about 30 booths run by businesses that support the LGBTQ+ movement. It will also have 20 booths offering different activities alongside a photo-taking area. Themed “Stay in Love,” the parade only consists of the "Rainbow Market" this year and the organiser Hong Kong Pride Parade said it was due to "countless reasons."

It said on its website that this year's pride parade is infusing the old with new elements, incorporating bazaar elements in the activities this year. It said, Hong Kong Pride Parade preserves highly interactive and most popular activities located at the finishing line in the past years, resulting in the new activity format of “Rainbow Market” to visitors.

The market will take place on 13 November in Kwun Tong and will be divided into three zones. The "Market Zone" boasts 30 small booths of different types of LGBTQ+ supportive businesses; the "Stay in Love Zone" offers 20 booths of sponsors, participating groups and the official activity booths of Hong Kong Pride Parade; while the "Pride Zone" provides different types of rainbow art installations for photo taking.

The organiser explained that this year's market celebrates the theme of “Stay in Love", highlighting alienation, loneliness and separations that afflict LGBTQ+ members. This may come as a form of parental opposition that separates them from partners, or it could be the preservation of their true self that led to the breakdown of our family relationships. Hong Kong Pride Parade added that separations are the result of the discriminative and unjust societal system, which has put the members of the community under senseless and meaningless torment.

Due to the pandemic, mass rallies or parades can hardly take place in the city except the Hong Kong Marathon last Sunday. Last year, Hong Kong Pride Parade was launched online with the theme of “Here and Proud" as the police had issued a letter of objection. Signer Terence Siufay, who came out last year as gay, and pro-democracy activist Figo Chan were sworn in as Rainbow Ambassadors during the event. 

The organiser added, “Even if you weren’t courageous enough to set foot on the streets, even if we can’t parade in the streets that day, there will always be a way to support the LGBT community.”

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