Members of Penn's gay community gathered at the wall of the old University Bookstore building at 38th and Walnut streets yesterday to kick off B-GLAD '99 by painting a symbolic rainbow logo on the wall. B-GLAD -- Bisexual Gay Lesbian Transgendered Awareness Days -- is an annual celebration of gay pride and awareness, sponsored by several organizations across campus. Upcoming B-GLAD events throughout the next week and a half include a rally Wednesday on College Green, an open mike talent show -- called Qabaret -- on Friday night at Harnwell College House, a dance at the Veranda on Saturday and an interfaith celebration of the gay community Sunday, co-sponsored by Hillel, the Christian Association and the Office of the Chaplain. "[B-GLAD is] a celebration of [the gay lesbian transgender] community and other communities in hopes to raise awareness about our issues as well as issues that face other communities," said Erin Cross, program coordinator of the Lesbian Gay Bisexual Center, a celebration sponsor. College and Engineering junior Andy Byala, chairperson of the Lesbian Gay Bisexual Alliance, also a sponsor, added that the events are "a chance for the queer students at Penn to celebrate who they are." He continued that the events are also a chance for the "straight students here [at Penn] to meet us and find more out about us and some of the issues that concern us." The theme of this year's events is "community," with the organizers "trying to look into some of the overlap" between the gay and straight communities, said College senior Alex Gino, co-chairperson of the B-GLAD planning committee. "Within the community and for all of Penn? I think there's a lot we can all learn," Gino said. The goals of B-GLAD, according to Engineering sophomore and planning committee co-chairperson Kurt Klinger, are "for the most part, to raise awareness? both in the queer community and everyone else." He added that the events' organizers hope that everyone -- gay and straight -- will attend at least one event and that in attending the various speeches and events people will "walk away with a better understanding of some of the issues we have to deal with." "Our events are open for everybody," Klinger said, adding that he hopes "anyone feels welcome, no matter who they are." Cross stressed that she "[hopes] everyone takes time to attend an event or support their friends because our issues -- queer issues -- are everyone's issues." Organizers said they are excited to have support from many groups across campus, including Allies -- which was founded in October for straight people who are concerned with gay issues -- and other organizations. "[Allies has said they] identify with the queer community, [and the queer community] is part of the Penn community," Gino said. "The student community has been a little bit more aware of us," Byala added. "People are concerned about who we are."
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