Rainbow Teen Safe Space

Greetings from Dding Dong!

From April to July, we kept ourselves busy with as well as reaching out to trans and genderqueer youths as well as organizing our regular programs. We also expanded our activities to regions other than Seoul; we set up booths at local queer cultural festivals and hosted the event called “Rainbow Flying Start” to meet with counselors, teachers, and social workers interested in connecting with queer youths.

“Rainbow Flying Start” is our special program developed to form a supportive community for queer youths in each region. LGBTQ teens who do not live in the Seoul Metropolitan Area tend to be more vulnerable to various crisis situations. Therefore, this program aims to create local communities that can support them as who they are.

“Dding Dong Kitchen”, our regular community lunch program with approximately ten LGBTQ youths each time, was held four times during the months of May and June. This program is also a place where we can share with one another our experiences, difficulties, and inconveniences we face as sexual minorities. In particular, we were able to hear stories from trans and genderqueer teenagers.

We can never emphasize enough how little information for self-reliance and how few role models are out there for them. For that reason, we plan to launch multiple programs specifically catering to young trans and genderqueer people during the remaining portion of the year.

“Dding Dong Pocha,” our monthly program has also been proceeding well. We provide counseling in the streets to directly meet with queer teenagers on the first Saturday of every month. We have recently had more vegan visitors, so we prepared vegan ddukbokki, fruits, and other snacks. We also provided counseling service, tarot card reading, and emergency supplies at “Dding Dong Pocha.”

Lastly, for the empowerment of the Dding Dong office, we participated in the special workshop “2019 Activist Workshop: Nurturing Gender Equality to Empower the Queer Community” organized by the Rainbow Action Against Sexual-Minority Discrimination. We attended the wonderful lectures titled “What is sexuality to queer people?”; “It’s okay between us?!: between difference and violence”; and “When you are a bystander.”

The workshop was truly a gem containing extremely helpful contents, from thought-provoking lectures to interactive sessions to review our own organizational culture and internal power relations. We are going to make the most out of the education we received at this workshop and continue to monitor Dding Dong’s organizational culture.

Hello,this is DDing Dong.

Finally, spring has arrived in Korea. We are sending you newsletter with our appreciation.

Last December and January, we got a steady stream of counseling requests from trans gender teens. We consulted with teens who had psychological difficulties caused by dysphoria and coming out, as well as those who have not received proper information or medical treatment as teenagers, and those who are having difficulties in gender rectification due to their age.

In Fabruary, we had three damage consultations related to being 'outed'. We in DDing Dong have been dealing with this issue constantly, and have actively counseled victimised LGBTQ+ youth to ensure their safety.

In March, as it is back-to-school season in Korea, there were more counseling requests for concerning bullying in school than other LGBTQ+ relate dissues. However, the number of crisis calls for support has increased, and the issues concerning the provision of support are often complicated. We have sought to support teenager sin crisis because of housing in stability mainly due to family violence and neglect.

We are glad todeliver you some good news, too. First,the new office now has more space for teenagers to relax, so there has been a big increase in the number of pre- and post- visiting (NB - I don't undertstand what this means)to the counseling center. In last 3 months, total of 78 LGBTQ+ teenagers visited tothecenter.

Second, DDingdong had advertised for DDingga DDingga. DDingga Ddingga is the name of the group for volunteers who share the values of Ddingdong . Thankfully, lots of people applied this time, and a total of 15 people joined as members of the 5th Ddingga Ddingga.

Regarding the challenge of volunteer straining, we studied and discussed the understanding of the various gender identities / sexual orientations / gender discrimination, education for the prevention of sexual violence / sexual discrimination / sexualabuse, addressing the legitimate concerns for the human rights for youth, and understanding HIV/AIDS.

Recently, we opened for DDing dong pocha as the first Ddingga Ddingga action. We are planing to meet more LGBTQ+ youth through not only pop- up restaurant but also DDingdong restaurant, Rainbow nevigation etc.

#DdingdongPocha is the program which runs on the first Saturday of every month where we directly go out to the streets and meet LGBTQ+ youth. We usually talk and eat together, and if necessary, we provide the items they need or counseling support.

#Rainbow Navigation is a support program for LGBTQ+ teenagers who want to be self reliant. We support them on their paths to be independent. In 2019, we are planing to have programs which can help free transgender youth from the gender binary, find their own true identities, enable their freedom of expression , and maintain a proper life cycle for themselves. We will consistently carry out these programs to ensure their desired gender representation and help them to have a place in their community, with respect and support.)

With globalGiving funding and warm-hearted sponsors, DDingDong is able to do various activities and programs. We really apprieiate your support and ask for your continued interest and love.

Dear Friends

Writing this letter With a warm heart. With your help of our global funding sponsors in 2018, we were able to meet 347 sexual minority youth.

We’ve had chance to meet youth with counseling issues including

suicide attempt (30), self-harm(38), mental health(101), interpersonal relationship(44), illness(9), HIV(2), injury(2) drug(2) Prostitution(2), transitions(34), worrying about sex(17), family conflict(85), family neglect(12), coming out(27), conflict with friends(40) conflict with teacher(14), relationship(37), gender identity(38), outing(28), discrimination(30), conversion therapy(3), hate crime(2), cyber bullying(13), domestic violence(32), Peer violence(15) violence of teacher(4), violence(3), dating violence(9), sexual violence(10), run away from home(16), independence(23), unstable housing(4), poverty(12), violation of labor rights(6), career / study (33)

Among them, 44 cases were intervened by our direct support system. including legal counseling and support(12), medical support and accompanying(7), psychological counseling connection and support(20), emergency residence connection(5).

Also we have a regular program called Dingdong restaurant. We invite 10 lgbt+ youth for a meal and various activities including educaional program, craft, and so on.

In addition, we have a counseling program on the street. We’ve held that program 8times total on the first Saturday of every month, and we were able to meet 377 sexual minority youth people .

There is one more program I’d like to introduce to you. It’s called “Rainbow navigation”. This program supports the youth who have left their home or who have plan to leave their home. A total of 11 youths participated in the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd sessions in 2017 ~ 2018. In the program, we tried to find ways to share difficulties, and support each others to live well as sexual minority youth.

We will continually work hard to make a shelter where we can provide food and shelter for 24 hours to lgbt+ youth in crisis. Thank you for all your support and love that you have sent. Please keep looking forward to see the better future what we are making together with you!

15th Aug, DDingDong moved to a new building. So we could make more spaces for LGBTQ+ youths. Now we have two private counseling rooms and they are bigger than the small one in the office we used to be. And there are more such as a brand new shower room and a cozy common room has comfort couches.

This year there were many local queer pride festivals. Like last year, DDingDong went to those cities as often as possible. We set booth in Gwangju and Busan Queer Culture Festival in Sep and Oct. And we held Moving DDingDong Lunch(Totobob) in each city. So we could meet many LGBTQ+ youths who live in those cities.

We counseled 20 LGBTQ youths in Jul, 17 in Aug and 21 in Sep. And we support LGBTQ youths in crisis providing food, daily necessities, medical services, counselling and so on.

We hosted DDingDong Lunch(Totobob) total 4 times for this three month including Moving DDingDong Lunch in Gwangju and Busan.

We continued outreach program, DDingDong Pocha(Korean Style Bar), it is held every first Saturday night of every month. We share some food and snack. And they can play some board games and if they want they can get a counselling. And we gave many condoms, lubricants, sanitary pads, lip balms, wet wipes, socks, underwears, vitamins and so on.

Last weekend DDingDong opened a booth in Seoul Queer Culture Festival. It’s the biggest LGBTQ event in South Korea. More than 500 LGBTQ Youth visited our booth and we handed out <Pride Passport> which contained a list of human rights for queer youth. Also, LGBTQ youth who got this passport can decorate it as they want to do, like their own pride flags and their names and so on.

We counseled 31 LGBTQ youths in Mar, 25 in Apr, 28 in May and 21 in June. And we support LGBTQ youths in crisis providing food, daily necessities, medical services, counselling and so on.

We hosted DDingDong Lunch(Totobob) total 8 times for this four month. And more than 40 LGBTQ Youth visited Totobop and had lunch together. (10 people each lunch). Especially this semester, we visited other region of korea, Joenju and Daegu so we could meet local LGBTQ youths in there.

We continued outreach program, DDingDong Pocha(Korean Style Bar), it is held every first Saturday night of every month. We share some food and snack. And they can play some board games and if they want they can get a counselling. And we gave many condoms, lubricants, sanitary pads, lip balms, wet wipes, socks, underwears, vitamins and so on.