London became a popular mecca for Latino gays in the early 90s. Consequently, there are
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I get tired of the image westerners have of Brazilian men," says Jose Resinente, "and many of my service users, especially the positive ones, find it a hard image to live down. Even they feel they have to play up to it. You know, we're all hyper-sexual, confident, live-for-today types.
"In fact many Latino men feel inferior to Europeans, have difficulty
asserting themselves in sexual relationships, and are very vulnerable
to HIV."
Jose is the worker for Naz Brasil, one of the two projects the NAZ organisation
run for Latinos and other members of the Portuguese- and Spanish-speaking
communities from their centre in west London. The other, Naz Latina, works
with Spanish speakers.
We are talking about a large, and largely hidden, group of Londoners.
There are estimated to be over 100,000 Brazilians in London alone - concentrated
in west London in areas like Hammersmith, and in Kennington and Stockwell
south of the river. Spanish-speakers from countries like Colombia and
Peru must nearly double this, and in addition Naz works with native Spaniards
and Portuguese, and Portuguese speakers from that country's other former
colonies - Angola and
Mozambique in Africa, Goa in India and tiny Macao opposite Hong Kong.
