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Many of Poland’s finest drag performers travelled to Warsaw for
the opening ceremony of the 16th Poland LGBT+ Film Festival.
Instead, our team was treated to a glittering evening
of Warsaw’s activist, drag and Queer communities,
bejewelled in a manner to rival the most glamorous drag
balls from home. I stopped worrying about Poland‘s
Queer population for a moment. In spite of the oppression
and repression of their culture and rights, the vibrancy
of a community, thriving in defiance and solidarity, was
tangible, and sparkled in the glitter of the fiercely creative
queens strutting on the red carpet, reminding me of how I
found my own footing in 1980s Alberta.
I was transported back in time: sitting with my
husband and my first roommate on the concrete steps,
massive columns framing the excitement. We smoke
and laugh, marveling at the epic drag creations, and the
hundreds of joyous Queers of every possible persuasion.
The air is warm, and a welcome escape from the humid
and throbbing intensity of the party indoors.
I’ve been here before. It’s the 2025 Polish
doppelgänger to the notorious Flashback loading dock:
Queers and queens and cigarette smoke. The joy
collected in one place is moving and inspiring.
Queer joy refuses to be legislated out of existence.
It erupts in the most difficult circumstances, in the most
challenging of locales, making even austere Communist
concrete fabulous.
EUROPEAN PREMIERE
Finally, our screening: the European premiere of Pride
vs. Prejudice: The Delwin Vriend Story. A packed
theatre, and my first time seeing the film with Polish
subtitles. Our Edmonton skyline, our Edmonton story
is on screens in Europe. I can feel the film hitting the
audience in all the right ways at all the right moments.
The sounds of shock at the disrespect shown by one
of the judges, the laughs and the tears. This story
of courage, persistence and resistance transcends
languages and cultures.
Photos top left & right: JoAnne Pearce
Senator Wells and Doug Stollery fielded questions from students
at the University of Warsaw about Canada’s fight for equality.
WARSAW UNIVERSITY
The next afternoon was a special screening of our film
for students at Warsaw University, introduced by Doug
Stollery, Doug Kerr and Senator Wells.
Casa, a student at the French Studies Institute, asks
the first question after the film — poignantly outlining
the situation for so many young adults.
“I would just like to ask, how do you find the
power, the strength and the energy to keep fighting
those fights, to finally be able to be considered just
as a human being? … I feel like I’m a very passionate
advocate for the community. And sometimes I just feel
so sick that my existence is just a political conversation
over dinner,” she says. “How do you keep fighting?”
Doug Kerr reaches into his own experience for
his reply.
“This morning we were in the Canadian embassy
and we met some young Polish activists who work on
LGBTQ rights in schools here in Poland. And they
were dynamic and they were determined, and they
reminded me of me when I was 20 … you keep doing
this work. And that’s what gets me inspired. I work with
people all around the world … every place I go, I meet
young people who are doing this work. And that’s what
gives me hope … it is you that will give me hope.”
OPENING CEREMONIES
On opening night of the Poland LGBT+ Film Festival,
I was prepared for a restrained event, knowing that
Poland remains near the bottom of the list of EU
nations when it comes to Queer equality.
Doug Stollery with Catherine Godin, Ambassador of Canada to
the Republic of Poland.
22 Together we thrive