From the film Listen to me: Carabina, 21

When I was in third grade, I had fallen in love with a boy so much so that I had written him a letter. He showed that letter to our home room teacher.

The home room teacher took me to the school principal. We were waiting beside the secretary, and my mom was there as well. When they called in my mother, I ran away from school.

I returned home very late …after I gathered the courage to do so. My father was laying down. He had  the letter. He said, “ Dear son, take the letter and read.” I got the letter, started reading, and my father started to beat me up with a wooden cane. Then he crashed the chair on me, and that broken chair as still at our house. He was beating me so hard, that it was painful to inhale and exhale.

Then my brother who was 10 years older than I came in. I was dabbling on the floor. No sooner had my father finished beating me up, my brother started beating me up. They were not letting my mother intervene. I was house bound for two months.

Since then, I understood what freedom meant.

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“Listen to me” is a documentary film about LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgenders) community in Armenia.

The film will be on the screens in October of 2016.