26 year old Frank Lileza came out to his grandmother when he was eight years old. He recognizes how fortunate he has been to have a family that accepts his sexuality. Many from the Mozambican LGBTQI+ community are ostracized by their families. Wider society has not been as accepting: “I am a homosexual man, but all the time I was kind of having some girls' style, like the way I walk, the way I talk, the way I express myself. And people would notice that. People were actually saying some very ugly names because the way I was expressing myself, the way I was standing myself in being in this environment.” Maputo, Mozambique. 15 February, 2018. Photo Robin Hammond/Witness Change

Frank /

“My name is Frank Liliza. I am 26 years old. I born at Maputo, Mozambique. I’m going to talk about a little bit of the pages of my life. I have a very supportive family in terms of accepting the way I was different by them. That was the very beginning because my family and friends, they wanted to know who I am. At the same time, they were afraid of what I was. A very important fact in my life was when I was 20 years old I fell in love with my colleague from college. We were just matching all the time, but we can’t live our love story because no one from school will understand what we felt for each other was love. I still love him until now. That makes me sad because I think he moved on, and I still have feelings for him.”

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