RSVP Vacation said Monday that it will be the company’s first cruise in the islands.

The seven-day cruise aboard NCL’s Pride of America departs Honolulu Oct. 30. It makes calls at Maui, Kauai and the Big Island before returning to Honolulu Nov. 6.

Hawaii Tourism Authority’s vice president of marketing, David Uchiyama, says Hawaii is honored that RSVP selected the state for its Silver Anniversary Cruise.

The Minneapolis-based company hosted its first all-gay cruise in 1986. Since then, RSVP says more than 80,000 men and women have participated in its ship and riverboat cruises, land tours and resort vacations. over the campaign documents could push back the closing arguments.

Editor’s question: Have you ever been on a gay cruise? To where? With whom? What did you think?

It wants gay honeymooners trekking through the Himalayas.

It wants to host the world’s highest same-sex wedding at Everest base camp.

But mainly, the conservative Hindu nation wants a chunk of the multibillion dollar gay tourist market to help pull it out of poverty.

That quest – brushing aside historical biases in pursuit of economic opportunity – is symbolic of one of the gay rights movement’s most stunning successes.

Just five years ago, police were beating gays and transsexuals in the streets.

Now, the issue of gay rights is almost passe here.

Nepal has an openly gay parliamentarian, it is issuing “third gender” identity cards and it appears set to enshrine gay rights – and possibly even same-sex marriage – in a new constitution.

“(It) is not an issue anymore, for anybody,” said Vishnu Adhikari, a 21-year-old lesbian. “Society has basically accepted us.”

That acceptance has become a major marketing opportunity for a country cursed by desperate poverty, but blessed with majestic beauty.

Tourism is one of the main drivers of Nepal’s economy, worth about $350 million last year, and government officials are determined to double tourism to 1 million visitors next year.

They hope gay tourists will be far more lucrative than the backpackers who stay in cheap hotels here and travel on shoestring budgets.

“They do have a lot of income … they are high-spending consumers,” said Aditya Baral, spokesman for the Nepal Tourism Board. “If they behave well, if they have money, we don’t discriminate.”

The driving force is Sunil Pant, a member of parliament, the nation’s most prominent gay activist and founder of the new Pink Mountain tour company.

The nation’s mountains, food and culture are a natural tourist magnet, he said. Additionally, gay tourists could get married at Everest base camp and honeymoon on an elephant safari – though since Nepal doesn’t marry foreigners, such weddings would have no legal status, he said.

“With that, money will come here and jobs will be created,” he said.

A growing segment of the gay tourism market – worth $63 billion in the U.S. alone – craves adventure travel and exotic locations, especially if they are seen as hospitable to gay travelers, said John Tanzella, president of the International Gay and Lesbian Travel Association.

As for an Everest wedding, “I think there would certainly be a niche within our community that would be very excited for this type of memorable experience,” he said.

Pant says Nepal also has a huge advantage in appealing to this niche because its neighbors in South Asia – some of them with laws outlawing homosexual sex – are not seen as gay-friendly destinations.

“There is virtually no competition,” he said.

Nepal’s own journey into gay acceptance has been a near-revolution, born out of chaos and conflict that decimated the nation’s traditional political and social systems.

A few years ago, the kingdom was torn by a civil war between the government and Maoist insurgents, and fighters on both sides preyed on marginalized communities and outcasts.

Transgender men, known as metis or eunuchs, were often robbed, beaten and sometimes raped at Maoist checkpoints, and again at government checkpoints, said Pant, head of the Blue Diamond Society, a gay rights group. Other than the metis, homosexuality was almost never discussed in the rural areas, where tradition pushed people into arranged marriages at a young age, he said.

Then, in 2006, the government signed a peace accord with the Maoists. Street protests forced the king to end his brief grab for absolute power and the centuries old monarchy was abolished.

In 2007, the Supreme Court ordered the government to draw up new laws to protect gay rights.

Now, the gay community stands to win big as the country writes a new constitution aimed at remaking the entire government, turning the nation into a republic and cementing peace.

The government has issued a handful of third gender identity cards. The next census is expected to allow respondents to choose between male, female or third gender.

Parliament is working on a same-sex marriage law even as the constitution drafters are incorporating gay rights into the document expected to be ratified later this year, said Pant.

“It’s a land of minorities and we support each other,” Pant said. “We all have been marginalized so long and it makes sense that we extend solidarity to each other’s rights and issues.”

In a sign of how much the nation of 30 million has changed, the gay community faces no real opposition in its fight for expanded rights, said Ameet Dhakal, editor in chief of the Republica daily.

The major parties, battling for votes, see no benefit to alienating a community that Pant says numbers at least 200,000, and religious leaders here generally stay out of politics.

Dev Gurung, a senior Maoist party leader who was once viewed as a strong opponent of gay rights, now publicly supports legal protections for the community.

“People, including lawmakers and government officials, were not aware that people like them even existed in the past,” he said.

Homosexuality has now entered the cultural lexicon. There is a weekly TV show called “Third Gender” and writers and filmmakers have begun exploring society’s treatment of homosexuals.

Poet Usha Sherchan published a short story last year in a literary magazine about a closeted gay man struggling with the pressure to get married. She thought broaching the subject was a risky move. Instead, she was inundated with praise.

“I was shocked,” she said.

Despite the rapid gains, Pant recognizes the nation’s sensitivities, and wants to ensure that an influx of gay tourists doesn’t turn Nepal into a sex tourism destination.

“They should come for the trekking, mountaineering, the culture, food … and for weddings, of course,” he said.

Here’s a map of the route; the weekend’s events are here; Here are travel discounts if you haven’t booked yet. (Plus some cities, like New York, are sending free buses.)

From the National Equality March:

Nobody has been more anxious about getting our final march permit than the volunteers working for the National Equality March. Permitting is typically given approximately one month before the event. The permitting office only recently finished their September march permit requests and finally got to ours as they go in by order of month, not date of request submission. The march route request was agreed on last week but needed one final signature from a Commanding Officer that was out of town. Today 9/29/2009 it was signed off and we now officially have the march permit. Click to download PDF file of the march route and click to download a large map of the DC area. Thank you for our patience and we are glad this one is finally behind us.

• Gather on 15th Street at “I” (Eye) Street – we will be staging in the street and 15th between “I” Street and “M” Street will be closed for this purpose. The March will kick off from 15th and I Street, right near McPherson Square (Metro stops close by are at McPherson Square, Farragut West – both Blue and Orange Lines, and Farragut North – Red Line)
• From there we go South on 15th to “H” Street
• West on “H” Street to 17th Street
• South on 17th Street to Pennsylvania Avenue (closed portion)
• Pennsylvania Avenue (closed portion) – right past the White House – to 15th Street
• South on 15th Street to Pennsylvania Avenue South
• East on Pennsylvania Avenue South, all the way to the U.S. Capitol West Lawn for the National Equality March Rally.

Awards include “Sexiest Place on Earth,” “Best Breakout Destination,” and “Best Gay Bar in the World.”

TripOutGayTravel.com is also honoring Richard Gray, who they are calling one of the founders of gay travel, with the first-ever “The Gay+ Award for Achievement in Making Our World Gayer.”

 Results will be announced on Nov. 2, 2009.

(New York City) New York City officials are turning to gays and lesbians to help reduce a projected $4 billion budget deficit.

The nation’s largest city unveiled a marketing campaign Tuesday to attract more gay and lesbian tourists from around the country and the world as other U.S. cities compete to strip New York of its title of No. 1 vacation destination for gays and lesbians.

The Rainbow Pilgrimage campaign comes as state and city officials grapple with diminishing revenue resulting from the global economic meltdown, which is forcing many people to forgo leisure travel plans or take so-called staycations near home.

The campaign kickoff also comes months in advance of the June 40th anniversary of the Stonewall riots in Manhattan, considered the start of the modern gay liberation movement.

“This is a tough time for New York City’s budget,” said openly gay City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who made the announcement with Council Member Rosie Mendez and city tourism officials. Quinn noted that 20 percent to 25 percent of the city’s revenue comes from Wall Street, which remains in turmoil.

An estimated 47 million people visited the city last year, a record high that generated $30 billion in spending, also a record over 2007’s $28.9 billion, according to the mayor’s office. Gays and lesbians accounted for about 10 percent of those figures.

But state officials are predicting a decline this year in the city’s tourism industry.

The new campaign will highlight New York’s reputation as a gay-friendly travel destination and tout a visit to the city as a “rite of passage.” The campaign will include advertising on niche Web sites and in magazines, as well as bus stop shelters, utility poles, street furniture, telephone kiosks and railroad stations.

The NYC & Company nonprofit that handles marketing and tourism for the city is working with Travelocity.com and numerous hotels, restaurants and Broadway theaters to offer discounts. George Fertitta, the organization’s chief executive, said the announcement was made months before the Stonewall anniversary in late June to give potential tourists time to make plans.

NYC & Company spent $190,000 in city taxpayer money on the campaign but estimates that, through partnerships with advertising agencies, its value reaches nearly $2 million.

Overall, New York City remains the top leisure and business travel destination for gays and lesbians followed closely by Las Vegas and San Francisco, said David Paisley, a senior projects manager at Community Marketing Inc., a tourism research company that specializes in gay and lesbian consumers.

“There’s increasing competition from cities who are reaching out to gays and lesbians,” Paisley said. “New York needs to respond or it’ll lose the No. 1 position.”

The annual economic impact of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender travelers is about $70.3 billion in the United States, according to Community Marketing.

“It clearly is a market that has the flexibility to travel,” Fertitta said.

Forget business as usual. Instead, we should stop doing business with a country that is proud of its persecution against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.

Our goal is to turn Jamaica into a pariah state, as long as GLBT people live in a state of terror. This means no more subsidizing the anti-gay slaughter by drinking Myers Rum and Red Stripe Beer. It requires skipping that Carnival Cruise to Jamaica — so your money won’t support murder.

If Jamaica were anymore homophobic, it would change the name of its signature music, reggae, to “ray-straight.” The national song would be, “Wasting the Gays Again in Murderitaville.”

Why boycott? Because Jamaica is on a downward spiral and suffers from collective cultural dementia on this issue. There is clearly a pathological panic and homo-hysteria that has infected this nation at its core. Consider that the Jamaica Cancer Society has raised concerns that the fear of being labeled gay is causing some Jamaican men to avoid prostate examinations, causing one of the highest prostate cancer rates in the world.

The second reason to boycott is because traditional activism has failed. I first read about Jamaica’s horrific violence against gay people in a 2004 New York Times editorial, “Hated to Death in Jamaica.” In 2006, Time Magazine had an article about the island headlined, “The Most Homophobic Place On Earth.”

One would think that such chilling headlines would have spurred worldwide action against Jamaica. Instead, the climate has only deteriorated, with a 2008 New York Times article titled, “Attacks Show Easygoing Jamaica Is Dire Place for Gays.”

A scathing State Department report on Jamaica’s treatment of homosexuals reads like a horror novel:

“The Jamaica Forum for Lesbians, All Sexuals, and Gays (J-FLAG) continued to report human rights abuses, including arbitrary detention, mob attacks, stabbings, harassment of homosexual patients by hospital and prison staff, and targeted shootings of homosexuals.”

Questioned by the BBC, Jamaica’s Prime Minister Bruce Golding said that he would not allow gay people to serve in his Cabinet. In March 2009 he added, “We are not going to yield to the pressure, whether that pressure comes from individual organizations, individuals, whether that pressure comes from foreign governments or groups of countries, to liberalize the laws as it relates to buggery.”

A third reason for a boycott is because we can have an impact in Jamaica. The tropical island earned $2.1 billion from tourism in 2006, with 1,025,000 arrivals from the United States. Clearly, Jamaica is uniquely vulnerable to economic pressure and thus every effort should be made to push for change.

A fourth reason to boycott is that a message needs to be sent throughout the world: “Gay people will no longer sit by passively while our people are brutalized and killed.”

If we do not stop the hate in the one place we can – Jamaica – it will continue to be open season against gays across the world. There must be consequences for state sanctioned gay bashing. Such countries will not change on their own — so economic carrots and sticks must be applied.

The current, failed strategy is “treadmill diplomacy”, where we send off a few letters to embassies and hope things will magically improve. It may feel like we are advancing, but we are really, at best, running in place. This explains why the news headlines about Jamaica’s treatment of gay people in 2004, look remarkably like the terrifying ones in 2009. The choice is ours, we can be meek in the face of madness – or we can take action.

Finally, Jamaica is an island of self-righteous hypocrites. The Bible is used to rationalize brutality, and vigilante violence is justified with talk of virtues and values. But, the island is quite comfortable with ganja and gratuitous sex for heterosexuals. Jamaica’s new motto should be, “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” (Unless you’re gay).

If you are a bar owner, please take Jamaican products out of your establishment. Consider a “rum dump”, where Myers’ rum is poured down the sewer. If you care about gay people, tell everyone you know about the dismal human rights record of Jamaica. And, if a friend has booked a trip — express your disapproval and send him or her accurate information.

It is truly a crime if you spend another dime in this homophobic hellhole. If you have gay family members, neighbors, coworkers or friends, book a holiday where it is okay to be gay.

As for Jamaica, don’t play, don’t pay, don’t stay.

While I delighted in wonders like the Statue of Liberty and the Empire State Building over the next few days, I could pretty easily sense that my normally mellow parents were operating in a state of constant nervous hysteria amidst the hustle and bustle of a city that wasn’t showing them a lot of mercy.

On the morning we left town, Dad was so anxious to get out that he hastily parked our car in front of the hotel while retrieving Mom and me, only to find upon our return that it’d been towed. This induced another of my most distinct early New York memories, that of my mother sobbing quietly in the back of a cab en route to the tow yard. Hundreds of 1970s dollars later, we were safely back in our car, and the joy of imminent escape was palpable.

But the city still had one more surprise up its sleeve on this late June 1972 Sunday afternoon.

Dad wanted to swing downtown to glimpse the almost complete World Trade Center, but hadn’t counted on a traffic-stopping protest march. As we watched from the sidelines, a procession of odd looking characters streamed past, the likes of which I’d never seen before.

“Daddy, what are they doing?” I asked. “Oh, they’re just a bunch of clowns,” said Pops. They didn’t look like any kind of clowns I knew. Crazy hair and big smiles maybe, but where were the rubber noses and oversized shoes? Only much later did I realize that we’d borne firsthand witness to the third New York City Gay Liberation Day March.

I didn’t return to the city until I was an adult, if only barely. As part of a fairly tumultuous period coming both of age and out, several fellow art-homo Michiganders and I decided to spend spring break 1983 in Manhattan, where we shacked up at the Hotel Chelsea. Almost instantly we were swept up into the then-über-hot Danceteria club scene, so irreparably that our week-long visit morphed into a month, and then six.

By day we lived in squalor, crashing on fluid-stained mattresses, four to a room (plus the roaches) that was barely big enough for one.

But it was enough for us to be cool by night, hanging out in the midst of Klaus Nomi, Andy Warhol, John Sex, Madonna, and a host of other of the day’s biggest downtown luminaries. Fortunately for my health my money ran out, and I skulked back to the Midwest.

After detox, life reassessment, and two years of film school in Chicago, I transferred back to NYU to finish up my BFA at Tisch. My New York experience this go-round was far less glamorous, but certainly no less colorful.

I lived on Mulberry Street in what was then still Little Italy, sharing a first floor railroad-style apartment that had last been occupied by the mother of a mob boss. Italian ladies dotted the windowsills above our block, keeping a constant watchful eye on everything that transpired below. Our building’s prime matriarch was Dolly, who started my every morning with a hearty, “Hi Danny, howwayuh?”

The loud cracks of Fed line-tapping syncopated every phone conversation, and every Wednesday night the street would fill with black Mercedes from John Gotti’s weekly wiseguy summit, held literally opposite our place.

We were burgled once, and our heretofore unseen (and never seen again) landlord appeared at our door as if from central casting. When he told me who he was, I went to shake his hand, only to realize it was missing a few fingers.

“If I ever find out who did this,” he assured me ominously, “they’ll pay.” Never have I believed anyone so strongly.

After graduation, I opted to switch coasts to Los Angeles to pursue a screenwriting career, but as fate would have it instead I worked a string of entertainment industry jobs before morphing back into writing.

In the interim, I made several memorable visits back to New York. In 1990, I spent a week here with my then-boss Rob Lowe when he hosted Saturday Night Live. In ’94 I came for the 25th anniversary of the Stonewall riots, and I was here six years later when Hillary Clinton took part in her first NYC Pride Parade.

And I came for the final Wigstock on Chelsea Pier over Labor Day weekend in 2001, just days before 9/11.

Not long after that I started caring for my wonderful mom, who’d contracted Alzheimer’s. When she passed rather poetically on the last day of 2005, I knew it was time to finally leave L.A. behind and come home to New York for good.

I’ve been back for a year and a half now, and I’ve loved every minute of it. I love the sights, I love the smells, I love the random bits of overheard conversation, and I love that I never know what I’m going to experience the next time I walk out my front door.

I live in the East Village, just a few blocks away from the scene of my first-ever job in the city, handing out flyers for the Pyramid Club, unbelievably 25 years ago now. The neighborhood’s changed a lot since then, as has the whole town, and I can’t say that I’m crazy about all of the changes.

The Hotel Chelsea is currently being “cleaned up” and transformed into a boutique property, and the first floor Mulberry Street apartment from my NYU days is now a trendy Nolita dress shop.

On the other hand, the Pyramid was recently nominated by the Greenwich Village Society of Historic Preservation as the city’s first potential drag landmark. But they’re all just buildings anyway. And at the end of the day, New York’s soul has very little to do with buildings, and everything to do with its people, of which I feel lucky every day to be one.

As excerpted from The Out Traveler Guide to New York City (by Dan Allen, Alyson Books, 2008).

Dan Allen is a regular contributor to The Advocate, Out, The Out Traveler, Logo’s TripOut, The Miami Herald, and many other publications.

In July, President George W. Bush signed legislation repealing a rule that prevented HIV-infected immigrants, students and tourists from receiving U.S. visas without special waivers. The ban also held up U.S. adoptions of children with HIV.

Since then, the administration has been accused of dragging its feet in implementing the change.

The ban was originally enacted in 1987, and explicitly restated in 1993, despite efforts in the public health community to remove the ban when Congress reformed U.S. immigration law in the early 1990s.  

Under the new regulations announced by DHS, Department of State consular officers overseas will now have the authority to grant temporary, non-immigrant visas to otherwise eligible applicants who are HIV-positive and meet certain requirements the agency said.

“This regulation significantly improves the opportunities for individuals seeking to visit the U.S. who were previously inadmissible because of an HIV infection,” said Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. 

“Perhaps most important to the applicants, we’re also accelerating the process by providing an additional avenue for temporary admission, while maintaining a high level of security at our borders.”

The HIV Waiver Final Rule will apply to foreigners who are HIV-positive and seek to enter the United States as visitors for up to 30 days; these individuals still must meet all of the other normal criteria for the granting of a U.S. visa.  

The issuance of visas under the rule will also be subject to certain criteria designed to ensure an HIV-positive person’s activities while in the United States do not present a risk to the public health.  

Travelers who do not meet the specific requirements of the rule, or who wish to follow the pre-existing process, may elect to follow the existing procedure for a case-by-case determination of their eligibility for a visa and admission authorization.

Visas issued under this final rule will not publicly identify any traveler as HIV-positive, DHS said.

But the agency noted that the changes do not automatically amend existing regulations, administered by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that continue to list HIV as a “communicable disease of public-health significance.”  HHS is currently beginning the rulemaking process to remove HIV from this list.

But nearly two months after President Bush signed that act into law, his administration has yet to take the steps needed to put the new law into practice, and lawmakers and advocacy groups are wondering what is going on.

“We write to encourage you to act quickly to remove HIV from the list of communicable diseases of public health significance and end the HIV travel and immigration ban,” Sens. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Gordon Smith, R-Ore., main backers of the measure in the Senate, wrote to Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt last month.

Fifty-eight House Democrats last week went right to the top, writing a letter to Bush that urged him to take “swift action on this issue.” The signees included California Reps. Barbara Lee, chief sponsor in the House, House Oversight Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, and House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Howard Berman, all California Democrats.

Last July 30, Bush signed into law a five-year, $48 billion bill to fight AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis around the world and to end the ban on HIV travelers.

But before the statutory ban can effectively be ended, HHS must write a new rule, submit it for public comment and finalize it.

“Congress has sent a clear signal that we can’t fight discrimination and stigma abroad until we end them at home,” said Victoria Neilson, legal director of Immigration Equality. “Congress has done its part – it’s time for HHS to act.”

“We’re working hard to revise the regulation and it’s our goal to have it completed during this administration,” said HHS spokeswoman Holly Babin. She said it was “a time-consuming process and we are giving it the attention it deserves in an effort to anticipate all issues and get it right.”

HHS added HIV to the list of communicable diseases that disqualified a person from entry in 1987, a time of widespread fear and ignorance about the disease. The department in 1991 tried to reverse that decision but was opposed by Congress, which in 1993 went the other way and made HIV infection the only medical condition explicitly listed under immigration law as grounds for inadmissibility.

While there is a cumbersome waiver process, the law has effectively kept out thousands of students, tourists and refugees and complicated the adoption of children with the HIV virus. No major international AIDS conference has been held in the United States since 1993 because activists or researchers who have the virus can’t gain entry. There’s also concern that foreign nationals in the country with the virus might not seek treatment because of fears of being deported.

Only about a dozen countries around the world, including Libya, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Sudan, ban travel and immigration for people with HIV.

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, at the August conference in Mexico City, said the restrictions, also imposed by his own country, South Korea, “should fill us with shame.” Others at the conference praised the United States for ending its ban and said that could set a precedent for other countries that exclude people with HIV.

Advocates said that having won international plaudits for the new law, it’s time to follow through.

“We’ll continue to pressure Secretary Leavitt to finish the job and eliminate regulations that keep that unfair policy in place,” said Allison Herwitt, legislative director at the Human Rights Campaign, the nation’s largest gay rights organization.

However, if you’ve “been there, done that,” or are looking for a different kind of Aussie adventure, head south, and take a chance on the States of Victoria and Tasmania.

AUSTRALIA’S “SECOND CITY”

If Sydney is Marsha, Melbourne is Jan (but we all know the later was really the cool Brady girl, right?).

Women at a street festival. All photos are by Michael Hammet.

Australia’s “second city” is expected to steal the spotlight from its big sister when it becomes the country’s most populous city within the next 20 years. It is already considered by many to be the arts and culture center of the country.

It’s an urban hub with cool clubs, top restaurants, historic architecture, museums, and fantastic shopping. The locals are so friendly I felt like Brad Pitt walking the streets with all the smiles and g’days (take a shot every time you hear “no worries” and you’ll be drunk in about five minutes).

Oh, and a river runs through it.

Since it’s birth in the mid-1800s, Melbourne has been growing up along the edge of the Yarra River. Early city planners designed within a central corridor as a way to curb future sprawl, so everything is just a short walk or tram ride away.

“They were way ahead of their time,” according to Dennis Newcombe, a phoenix-based urban planner.

I preferred the Yarra Tram system to a cab (the mostly foreign cabbies didn’t seem to know their way around town). Every bit of space is maximized.

This might explain the unique use of the city’s lanes – the alleys behind the main streets (with names like AC/DC Lane), lined with café tables, packed with people, and leading to the entrances of basement pubs, restaurants (Robot Sushi was a cool discovery) and cozy cafes.

At night, when the main streets are empty, the lanes are hopping. There also are tiny parks throughout town, called “green wedges,” that infuse nature into the cement and brick urban center.

CHECKING IN

I set my bags down at Hotel Lindrum – a cool boutique accommodation within a circa-1900 Romanesque Revival building, once owned by a family of tea merchants. Hotel rep Damian Hill says, “We’re in the center of Melbourne – so everything is just 20-minutes away.”

The space feels more like a home than a hotel, with modern finishes and warm colors complimenting the building’s original bricks and beams. There’s a professional pool table (from its days as a pool hall) and a pillow menu for the perfect night’s sleep.

Plus, there’s a library of the American Film Institute’s top 100 films of all time.

Next page: What to see, what to do