![]() ![]() ![]() She’s the one who sent me to high school. The ones that spoiled me the most were my sisters, especially the oldest, who treated me like I was her baby. PGN: Where do you fall in the family lineup? AT: I’m the youngest. We’d have a little picnic and be like, “Hi Dad! We are all here. Every Christmas we’d gather at her house and go to the cemetery to see my dad. My mother lived by herself about eight miles from where I lived with my sister, so it was a way to get everyone together and also make sure Mom-mom was OK. Mom went really crazy with it and we were reading the Bible every day. Then everything changed and everyone in the family, including my parents, became Catholic. Then I became a Catholic, which was her religion. My family was Buddhists until I lived with my sister and she helped me get into a Catholic high school. In Indonesia a lot of ethnically Chinese people don’t speak the language. We are Chinese-Indonesian - even though I can’t speak any Chinese. PGN: With such a big family, what was something you loved to do together? AT: We loved to go to church every Sunday. I hadn’t seen her for 10 years and I can’t see her anymore but I can lay flowers on her grave. It was very upsetting but what can you do? The first thing I want to do if I get my green card is to go back and see my mom. My dad is no longer with us and my mom died two years ago, but because of my immigration problems I couldn’t fly back for the funeral. AT: I have six sisters and three brothers. ![]() PGN: So back to your childhood: Tell me about the family and growing up. PGN: What do you like to do when you’re not together? AT: I’m crazy for tennis. We accept each other and who we are and work to make each other happy. ![]() He’ll spend time home with me just watching TV and I’ll go out with him to hang with his friends or to a club sometimes. I like to stay home, he likes to go out-but we compromise. We have our differences of course, especially with such an age span. He’s a very nice person, he’s cute, he’s the whole ticket. PGN: What first attracted you to Brian? AT: As I said, he’s very mature for his age. But the following day he came to me with a list of LGBT organizations that help with immigration issues and we contacted an attorney. After I explained that I was due to be deported on Valentine’s Day, he didn’t say much. Two weeks before Valentine’s Day in 2011, I told him, “Brian, I have an immigration problem.” He’s a very mature man and he just listened to me. When he saw my profile it said 35 years old! When we talked I told him the truth and told him I was too old for him but, fortunately, he didn’t care. I was a little bit lying to Brian about my age when we first met because there’s a big age difference - 18, 19 years. I met Brian through the chatting room or whatever they call it. I moved to this country in 2002, June I think. AT: I was born in Jakarta, Indonesia, 48 years ago. Last week, President Obama proposed an immigration-reform package that would include the provisions of the Uniting American Families Act, which would lift LGBT discrimination in our immigration law - and which can’t be passed soon enough for this local couple. isn’t among them -here, it’s a privilege reserved only for heterosexual married couples. Currently, more than 25 countries allow residents to sponsor gay and lesbian permanent partners for legal immigration but, sadly, the U.S. It’s a dilemma faced by many binational couples in the United States. That’s what happened to Brian Andersen and Anton Tanumihardja in February 2011. Imagine that you meet the man or woman of your dreams, and two weeks before your first Valentine’s Day, that person tells you s/he has to leave the country and may never be able to return. ![]()
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