All posts by Annie

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Information for Ugandans Fleeing Uganda

This is a frequently updated status page for those leaving Uganda.  Current update  07:38 9 May, 2023

We currently have NO funds to assist in leaving Uganda. We CAN offer advice and assistance if you have funds. We CAN get help to you if you are jailed in Uganda.

If you have medical training, are LGBT, and want to flee, talk to us.

If we are providing you services you should have direct contact with us. If someone is asking money of you or will not allow you to contact us they are a scammer. Our agents will always be introduced after you have contacted us. 

We will never ask you for money. We might ask you to pay your own expenses if you can (for example, buying your own bus ticket).

We’re seeing some organizers offering shelters for LGBT folks (particularly trans women) on the run, then being controlling. Don’t end up tafficked, in a brothel, or controlled by someone. Do not give the organizer your passport or other document “to keep safe”
Caution to those leaving Uganda – we are seeing some evidence of people trafficking. If people want to put you in a situation where they control you, ask yourself if you’re safe and if you want to do that. Often portrayed as “for your safety”
Do not delay getting out because you don’t have a passport. National ID is OK . You need a covid certificate and a yellow fever vaccination.
The border is fairly open. You can physically get out if you need to.
Info

Preparing for Civil Unrest

Many news organizations are reporting that Donald Trump will be arrested by the Manhattan District Attorney this coming Tuesday, March 21, 2023.

Hospitals, fire stations, the US Military, and police are gearing up for unrest. This NBC News report says the cops are on high alert. Jon Cooper, Biden’s campaign manager, asked on Twitter if followers expected rioting or unrest if Trump was arrested.  Replies from hospital workers and people living near military bases report they are gearing up.

Trans people are potential targets of violence. Don’t be paranoid or do things that harm you long term, but there are reasonable precautions you can take. You’ll have to weigh the cost of any of these actions against any safety they will bring. If you’re unemployed, going camping may be no big deal. If you’re going to be fired, maybe consider if it’s worth it.

Some things you can do to protect yourself:

If you have camping gear and the weather and your job allow, consider taking some trans folks and going camping for a few days. While encountering yahoos is always a possibility, you’re unlikely to discover an organized mob at your local KOA.

If you’re staying, lay in groceries – get some staples that survive without refrigeration  –  rice, canned goods. And just do the week’s shopping this weekend so you’re not having to do it in the middle of chaos.

Get fuel for the camping stove and Coleman lantern. Fill containers with water. Refill your prescriptions.

Check your bugout bag. Replace anything that’s been taken out.

Gas the car up and keep it full. If you have a chance, on Monday, it might be a good day to take the car in and have the oil changed, tires checked, and other routine servicing you’d do before a road trip.

Minimize going out. Keep an eye on the news, and use common sense. The evening after Trump has been arrested, think about security before going to Club Uranus and getting blind drunk.

Think about visibility. It’s been our best tool over the years, but don’t become a victim because you weren’t balancing danger and visibility.

That said, do celebrate! It’s been a long road.

Protect each other.  Make sure the unpopular girl at support group has your number. Call around your local trans community and see what others need. If you are, or know, the locally visible spokesperson for the community, invite them to stay with you a few days in case local yahoos have doxxed them.

If you think you might have to flee, get ready to bug out. I’m sure someone is going to yell ‘Trans Rescue is telling people to bug out’. We are definitely not. We are telling people to be on heightened alert.

Form affinity groups.  Have a small team that shares resources. One person has camping gear. Another has a good car.

Work across class. If you are a middle class person who always played by the rules, your most valuable group member might be a streetwise person, and vice versa.

Make sure there’s a clear way to make decisions. An argument that leads to the group breaking up is not good.

Get together and make sure you’re all agreed on general strategy.   If half the group believes all trans people should have a gun, and half think that’s a recipe for disaster, split the group.  Similarly, check in if anyone uses marijuana, is everyone OK with that? Have honest discussions about money.

Be cautious in who you accept rides/housing/etc from. Remember our enemies would love to get you in a dependent position, and on the internet nobody knows you’re a dog.

Let cis friends, employers, etc know that you are concerned. Enlist them as allies if you can, but avoid having your life depend on them. When the fash knock down the door and demand to know where the trannies are hiding, their priority will be their own safety.

This is written not to promote fear, but rather preparedness. Being ready and feeling stupid after is better than not being ready and feeling stupid after.

There is no evidence to suggest that a trans genocide is coming this week in America. It’s important to avoid spreading unfounded fears and spreading panic.  But it’s definitely a week to think about your options.

Header image: Becker1999 from Grove City, OH, CC BY 2.0.

Campaigns, Passenger Campaigns, WeGotThemOut

Blind Trans Woman Escapes Saudi Arabia

Today a young Saudi trans woman is safe in the asylum system of a European country.  Layla Al Darwish was born with the misfortune not only of being trans in the most repressive country on Earth, but with retinitis pigmentosa, a condition that has made her functionally blind.

After her parents discovered she’d contacted us, her father threatened to kill her. In Saudi, this is not an idle threat. The Saudi state will do nothing against a parent who harms their child. So we had to arrange her escape quickly.

This has been a very dangerous extraction, the most difficult and complex operation we’ve completed to date, spanning from June to December 2022. A half dozen very brave people helped Layla on her way. One of them nearly had loved ones killed doing so, and Layla was pursued by family members while on the road.

Her travels took her through the Republic of Georgia. We are deeply grateful for the assistance of Equality Georgia, who partnered with us in this operation.

Campaigns, Passenger Campaigns, Uncategorized, WeGotThemOut

Women Attacked in Bundibugyo, Uganda

Bundibugyo, Uganda

In the early morning hours of Wednesday, Dec 14, 2022, the house where five trans women lived together in Bundibugyo Uganda was raided by police. Three of the women managed to flee, but two others were beaten by police and local people, screaming “Are you men or women?”

The two women were arrested and taken to the local police station where they were sexually assaulted and further beaten.

We are assisting a local organization help all five escape to the local organization’s trans shelter in a safer place.

The local organization has arranged to free the two jailed women and provided medical care. We are extracting all five to a safer place.

Work like this requires funds. If you can, please give a small gift to help this keep happening.

Support The Work

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Passengers

  • Alexander Zaytsev
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Alexander Zaytsev

We recently got Alexander, a trans man, out of Russia.

He was in a tight squeeze – He was a senior at a prestigious university, and holding on trying to finish his degree. But the mobilization convinced him he’d best get out now.

We got him out by a roundabout route we don’t want to reveal, but in the end we got him to the Netherlands, and he’s now in an AZC and doing well.

We’re very grateful to his family, who supported him and worked closely with us to get him out, and to our donors who provided the funds to sustain him during his voyage.

We’ve made a short video of Alexander enjoying freedom.

https://youtube.com/shorts/upyJXzqImZ8
Info, Passenger Campaigns, Uncategorized, WeGotThemOut

When Trans People Are Registered.

One of our passengers has had experience with registries of trans people. In light of the recent decision in Florida registering trans minors, she thought it was important people know her story in her own words:

I’m over 30 in Hungary. Before they banned transition, I had my psychological evaluation in the way, and visited psychologists over my issues. After the ban in 2020, the psychologists told me they can not help me any more, and after a few months, some ministry’s office started to harass me on the phone, pretty much threatening me that if I attempt to transition, they will send me to jail or worse.

I reported such to the police and blocked the number.

Nearing 2021, police officers shown up at my workplace and asked me to come around to the nearby police office. The officers were apologetic and embarrassed, but “we just do what we are told to do”. In the office, some woman from a ministry (not from the police) started shouting at me about how being trans is an evil fad and corrupts children, and I should write an official paper that I am normal, not trans, never will be trans and fill in some data on it. I refused because it seemed like getting data and “I am cisgender, leave me alone”.

Then she shown the papers from my doctor, which they pretty much confiscated from the hospital. “Yes, I had a time when I was unsure, but I am sure now. Leave me alone.”

So as I left, a police officer called me aside and apologized in the name of the Hungarian police force, stating that this is from the ministry and they have to do this, smaller office, so they are doing what they are told to do. I left anyways.

The phone harassment did not stopped and near the end of 2021, officers came around again, but they just shrugged when I told them they got the wrong guy.

Early 2022, Trans Rescue helped me out of Hungary to a safe zone in the EU. They gave me a temporary house until I got on my feet and legally could stay in a country.

The harassing calls did not stopped, the Hungarian officials still tried to threaten me that if I ever return to Hungary with a changed gender, they will hit me “with all the power of the law”.

She, and we, thought it was important to get this out, but for obvious reasons she was reluctant to release it on her own.

Info, organizational news, Uncategorized

Bunkering Against Attack – Services Reduced

We have been under severe attack from some vicious trolls recently.

We have to be rather widely accepting in how passengers contact us. They are ordinary trans* folk, in danger, often under a parent’s thumb (yes, this is normal for a 26 year old in some countries). They may have limited contact options. So people come to us over social media, email, and the other normal ways of contact in an internet world.

But the trolls have been making such contacts very expensive. They create “sock puppets” — artificial accounts claiming to be trans folks in danger or volunteers. Sorting out ‘real’ approaches from the fakes is consuming huge amounts of effort.

Beyond that, and more importantly, we may make mistakes. If we, a few volunteers, get overwhelmed and decide an account is a sock incorrectly, some poor soul in Sudan or Egypt loses their lifeline.

And moving someone invariably involves discussing how to do it with them. Which leaks operational secrets.

We have to continue our work or passengers die. We have folks holed up in secret places inside repressive theocracies. If the police catch up they die. We are sending them money and keeping them on the move.

So, as a temporary measure, we are, sadly, taking some defensive measures. Any resulting deaths will be on the hands of the trolls.

First, we are only talking with people we know and trust. If we don’t know you, you’ll be directed to this page.

For new passengers, this cuts off help.

We had ‘closed intake’ a while back. It’s more humane to say ‘we’re full’ than to consume the trapped passenger’s time and possibly endanger them only to put them on a long backlog.

But people do come anyway, and we explain we have a backlog, and sometimes their problem is simple. So we take folks in when it’s realistic for us to help them in a reasonable time frame.

As of today, that stops. If we don’t know you we won’t talk with you. If that leaves you needing help, we’re terribly sorry. When the attacks stop we’ll go back to normal.

We are also getting volunteers. If you want to volunteer with us, you’ll have to find someone we know and trust and have them recommend you. And you should expect the first step in onboarding to be a more than usually rigorous check that what you say is true.

(And yes, this hurts us – Our only paid employee is Eden House’s manager. Everything else is done by volunteers).

If you’re here and you’re appalled – get angry. This defensive posture is a body blow to our fundraising. We will be trying to ‘shielter in place’ passengers, that’s often cheaper, but we will run out. And some need moved NOW.

So if you want us to keep working, pull out your credit card. It’s the only way we can keep passengers alive until this attack ends.

Donate

To those who we’re serving – we will stay with you. We are not going away. We are going to win this fight. You are going to have a good life in a place that respects you. Don’t give up.

Info, organizational news, Uncategorized

Some Things We’ve Done

I’m very worn out today and need to pick myself up. A journalist asked about our accomplishments, so I thought I’d write a bit of a brag piece.

Some of these are things done as TransEmigrate (who we were before), and with other groups I wish I could credit, but who I don’t want to mention for operational reasons or because we’re currently under troll attack. I think we’ve all been far more interested in the work getting done than credit.

We have helped people get out of danger, in these countries: Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Egypt, Sudan, Kenya, Uganda, Ghana, USA, UK, Northern Ireland, Russia, Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, the Maldive Islands, Turkey, Lebanon, and Syria.

How many depends on how much contact we need before it’s ‘help’. We’ve had ex passengers help get others out and tell us afterwards or be gotten out by supportive families. But the ‘count’ is about 20 people we have helped substantially.

We currently have 5 people “on the run” and supported by us. We also support Eden House until it can become self sustaining. In the past we’ve had about this many consistently.

And we work with others who don’t need our financial support (mostly they’re trying to escape parents in repressive countries) but who we are trying to get out.

We have started Eden House, a haven for trans and intersex folks on the Tenacious Unicorn Ranch model in Kenya.

We have started a program to advise people in places like the US and UK how to get out. We fear for the future in such places. If the US becomes a fascist autocracy a million people might suddenly be on the run.

And we feel like we’re raising awareness of the plight of trans people in dodgy places. No country wants to be known as a place we get people out of. It’s early days for this, but I’ve had at least one conversation with a government official who made it clear our actions were not appreciated by his government.

Finally, we’ve raised awareness of the plight of trans people in dodgy places among the western left. That has value of its own.

Info, organizational news, Uncategorized

Where Does The Money Go?

We’re a small organization in our first year with a small budget. We’ll be submitting normal accounts at the end of the year. But it’s not easy to read accounts without training, and it seemed we should give an account of where the money has come from and gone.

Unless otherwise specified, all values are in Euros.

Current Balance

We maintain an account with Bunq bank in the Netherlands.

As of Sept 25, 2022, we had 5273 euros in the bank: 1193.7 in ‘incomings’, 158.66 in admin, 87.32 in operations, 1601 in savings, and 1432 set aside for Eden House.

Eden House particularly needs stable funding, hence the relatively large amount set aside for it. We’ve just spent 4804 setting up and operating our first 7 weeks, so this fund is currently depleted.

We never know when someone won’t be let on a plane or we’ll be approached by someone who needs moved NOW. So we set aside a relatively large amount for savings, and currently have 1601 in that account.

Like any organization we have administrative expenses (bank charges, IT charges) and have 158 set aside for anticipated expenses. We transfer money from incomings to Operations as a fiscal control measure, and fund operations from the Operations account.

Income

We have raised 32923 euros to date.

Most of our income has come from small individual contributors. Our largest contribution has been the initial 3000 euro donation from an individual that started us.

We have received no grants or corporate donations.

We received a 2500 euro interest free loan from one of our board members to help get started. This money isn’t included in the above figure, and was used to incorporate and obtain ANBI status.

Google now provides us with a graph.

Expenditures

Expenditures

It can take us a long time to get a passenger out. For this reason the largest item is ‘support’ – sending frightened trans folk money to stay alive while on the run, and renting rooms in dodgy places. Eden House has been an attempt to reduce this cost.
Sometimes we’ve had to hold people somewhere simply because we didn’t have the funds to get them out. So this also inflates this number.
This number also includes some items we’d rather not describe because it would compromise our methods.
We spent 13485 on support.

Passenger travel is what we love to spend on – airline tickets, trains, and other transport. We spent 5153 on passenger travel. A separate category for ‘passenger paperwork’, we spent 162 euros on such items as passport charges.

Eden House has been our next largest expenditure. The 4804 investment is already greatly increasing our capacity to help people in East Africa and other places. Moving forward, we’ll spend 800-1000 euros a month for the next few months until self sufficiency programs kick in.

Sometimes we need to send a volunteer somewhere to physically help someone escape. These are often quite dangerous. We spent 1926 on staff travel.

We had charges of 553 for admin and 826 for IT. The large IT charge was because we were setting up systems, because we paid for TransEmigrate’s IT charges while TransAsylias was getting separated, and because it took us a while to be registered with Google for their Google for Nonprofits program.

Our only fundraising expense was 150 euros. We had a tent at “May Contain Hackers”, a ‘hacker camp’. This was an opportunity to ride along on activities a board member had to do anyway for their day job. While not a great success as a fundraiser, we developed many useful contacts.

We recently hired Arya Aurora for a combination role of Eden House manager and PR assistant. She’s been learning the PR role, but is already doing great work as house manager. Her salary is 250 euros/month, consistent with market rates for office worker jobs in Kenya.

There is a 340 euro discrepency in these figures. I believe it’s due to some refund, but since this post is not intended as a formal financial report, I’m simply going to acknowledge it and return to moving passengers.

What We’ve Done

In the past 9 months we’ve

  • Moved 18 people – some of them only partially
  • Helped another 6 survive while we figure out how to get them out
  • We are trying to help 4 more
  • Started Eden House
  • Started a program to advise people in non-emergency places like the US and UK how to get out
  • We had a program of emotional support for QTI folks stuck in dangerous places, run by a social worker, but we no longer have that resource.
  • Raised awareness of conditions for QTI folks outside EU/US

We feel like we’ve been good stewards of your donations. We do thank you for your ongoing, amazing support.

Header image based on photograph of Emirates Airliner by Arcturus~commonswiki used CC-by-CA-3.0