QUOTES OF THE YEAR - 2011 Lindsay Curnow and Juliet Leigh The tough times: "However, as one of our friends said, you've got each other and you've still got your fishing rod." - Lindsay Curnow looks on the bright side after the vandalism attacks and hellish arson of her and partner Juliet Leigh's Mangawhai Heads business, Blooming Bulbs. "Oh shit yes!" - Curnow again, when asked whether all the community support had helped. "And the Cathedral's come down. This place is like a war zone ... and it's still happening as well. They're still going on, the aftershocks." - Mr Gay NZ 2011 and Christchurch resident Aaron Comis, in the aftermath of the 22 February quake. "[It was like]walking into the living room at Christmas and wondering what shit gift Santa had given you." - Christchurch gay businessman Stuart Yeatman, on returning home after the quake. "I cannot express how sorry I am. Absolutely devastated doesn’t come close to describing how I am feeling. This would have been our ninth year but sadly due to events out of my control, I have lost everything - nine years of hard work gone." - Organiser Mike Sanford on his baby, Gay Ski Week, going into liquidation. Goodbye: "Carmen as we all knew came from this exotic land of New Zealand. Often she told us how life was better for trans there but lacked the excitement of the Cross - something our little group were fast coming to realise we could do without." - Friend Jacquie Grant reflects on Sydney life with Carmen. "With her passing we lose a friend, an icon, and an important player in the most significant period of gay history in this part of the world. Our only consolation can be that, wherever she is now, it will be a place that is incomparably more interesting and glamorous than it was yesterday before she got there." - Labour MP Charles Chauvel, on the passing of Carmen. The voices of our youth: "I still have hell with my parents, but I just keep thinking to myself 'it will get better eventually'. I dream of the day when I get to go out clubbing and become a drag queen. I dream of that. And I just know that one day it's going to happen." - Huntah Calder, 15, on surviving life in Gore as a gay teenager. "Hi everyone, I’m Ryan, and I like Metal music… And skateboard… And I want to be a photographer… And I wish I could still play rugby. And I also like girls, but not their dramas. Actually, I’m like most other normal and healthy 17 year old boys. Except that I go to Wellington Girls College. I didn’t start out there as Ryan. Thing is, being a girl just didn’t work out for me." - Ryan, at the Queering the Night march. "And for anyone who asks, I, Keith Labad, am a Catholic. I just also happen to be Queer. We are not taking shots at religion, but rather, we're trying to claim what we deserve as humans and that is our rights." - Former St Pat's student Keith Labad fights to be the ball date of a male friend. Humility: "Well, people call us icons but we're just another couple of lesbians like all the other girls." - Linda Topp. Justice: "Thank everyone for all the support, from me and Arie. Yes we are very happy, now we can get on with our life together." - Michael Davis, after all charges against him and his partner, Arie Smith-Voorkamp, were dropped. "As a defence lawyer whenever you are aware of a case where you think things aren't going to plan, maybe falling off the rails and someone is getting the raw end of the stick and maybe can't put that on track themselves, there's a sense of justice that prevails in you." - Smith-Voorkamp's lawyer Jonathan Eaton explains taking the case on, pro-bono. Comedians among us: Johnny Givens held up a copy of the street poster promoting the day's edition of the NZ Herald newspaper with a picture of Richie McCaw and the headline: 'Is he out?' "As a gay man my heart skipped a beat!" Givens dead-panned to laughter and applause. "Really, really sorry that my lovely, lovely wife can't be here but she is very knocked up... it was one drunken night and I didn't put a condom on..." - Anika Moa on stage at the Big Gay Out. "Girlfriend - let's face it, we all love a man in uniform and who better than our own wee Willy, if you'll pardon the pun," - Scotty and Mal of SandM's prepare for their Royal Wedding screening. Progress: "On the odd occasions when I started [wearing drag in public] you could guarantee that if I was driving along and saw a policeman coming the other way , there'd be a u-turn and the lights would be going on and they'd be pulling you over for a little chat. Whereas nowadays if you roll up at a breath testing stop you get 'Hi Buckwheat, how are you?' - Buckwheat reflects on the change in attitudes to drag. "We hope today every glbt person in the country takes a moment to say a personal and private thank you to all those who 25 years ago put their futures, careers, family relationships and even their lives on the line so we can today take our near-equality in the eyes of the law and increasing acceptance in society pretty much for granted. Without their passion and foresight life for us today would be immeasurably bleaker." - GayNZ.com Editor Jay Bennie on 25 years since HLR. "Piri was affirming the reality of takataapui. And he has firmly established that our Maori history and cosmology make no judgement on who you should or shouldn't love." - Observer Kevin Haunui on a speech by respected elder Piri Sciascia at the Wellington Outgames, where he asserted same sex love has always been an innate part of Maori life. Politics: "I got sick of yelling at the radio and thought it might be healthier to actually engage with the political process." - Green MP Jan Logie explains why she entered politics. "I'm leaving it until my book. I know the answer, but just wait until my book." - John Key clams up at the Big Gay Out when asked by Radio Ponsonby host Steven Oates whether he'd vote differently on civil unions, if a vote was held tomorrow. ''Frankly, I didn't trust the system to give a straight-shooter a fair deal ... It is dominated by self-serving unionists and a gaggle of gays." - Labour MP Damien O'Connor, on his own party's list. "I am in support of a Hero parade, but I don't think that's a Hero parade because actually they're not heroes. Heroes are people like Willie Apiata. Heroes are people who have done something. I don't think people should be defined, one way or another, by their sexuality. And they can have their parade. I wouldn't go. But I don't think a Hero is someone who wears leather shorts singing YMCA down Queen St." - National MP Chester Borrows isn't keen on an Auckland Pride parade. "[I'm] also not surprised because he does have a short fuse and sometimes engages his mouth before his brain is ready." - Gay Green MP Kevin Hague, a fellow West Coaster, in response to O'Connor's outburst. Outgames Human Rights Conference: "Let me tell you this: I was born with heels and I will die with heels." - Joey Joleen Mataele of the Tongan Leitis Association at the Outgames Human Rights Conference. "Please don't force us back into the closet just because we are older." - An elderly lesbian, from the floor, at the Conference. "But [I was] particularly happy to meet a current police officer who is lesbian. In a uniform, she can openly come out and declare she has a partner, have courage and mostly the possibility to do that, which is amazing," - Milan Shah, a Nepalese visitor at the Conference, who was thrown out of Nepal's army and into a prison cell after declaring love for a woman. “Tim [Barnett] was always desperate to claim he was the first out sitting MP. He must have missed six weeks of the Truth in 1976.” - Marilyn Waring, also at the Conference. “We are battling towards dignity. And I hope we get there in my lifetime.” - Waring again. From the media: "Residents complained of gay men popping up in the dunes 'like meerkats.'" - The Dominion Post reported in a story about cruising at a Kapiti Coast beach. "She has the strange, though undoubtedly not unique, idea that lesbians are lesbians because they've been hurt by men, and so understands how they could 'be turned off' by men." - The Weekend Herald's Michele Hewitson after interviewing Hannah Tamaki. Rugby: "The team also has a good balance of shapes and sizes, with some big and beefy players, some hirsute, some clean-cute, some suave and sultry. And even a twinky Justin Bieber look-alike." - Dean Knight on selection of the Queer Eye For the Rugby Guy RWC 1st XV. From across the world: "No matter how quietly homophobia is whispered, it doesn't make it any less loud. You can't whisper hate." - The powerful response from L Word star and musician Leisha Hailey to Southwest Airlines' jumble of excuses for throwing her and her girlfriend off a flight, after they kissed. "Can I tell you something? Will you love me, serious? ... Dad, I'm gay. I always have been, I've known since forever, and uh, I know I haven't seen you in like a year, and I don't know when's the next time I'm going to be able to see you, I didn't want to tell you over the phone, I wanted to tell you in person." - US soldier serving in Germany calls his father at home in Alabama to tell him he's gay after "don't ask, don't tell" finally ends. "It's a complicated issue, but they seem to be in a loving relationship of some sort." - Joe Torzsok, chair of the Toronto Zoo board, on male penguin couple Buddy and Pedro. "I started to take more pride in my appearance, bleached my hair and started working out. I went from a 19-stone skinhead to an 11-stone preened man." - Welsh man Chris Birch, on waking up gay after a stroke. "It became clear to me in an instant that living a gay life without publicly acknowledging it is simply not enough to make any significant contribution to the immense work that lies ahead on the road to complete equality." - Heroes star Zachary Quinto, on coming out. "Even though they are identified as male characters and possess many human traits and characteristics… they remain puppets, and do not have a sexual orientation." - Sesame Workshop, on calls for Bert and Ernie to be outed. "Is it true that the lives of heterosexual Mancunians are haplessly intertwined with transvestites, transsexuals, teenage lesbians and a horde of homosexuals? Is Manchester now the Sodom of the North?" - Daily Mail writer Brian Sewell doesn't like Coronation Street. "You are adamant that you are a special gender, that is why some of you have spent considerable money on special operations ... Every year you all look very different. Blonde hair, glossy lipstick sporting Gucci handbags and us men continue to be taken in by your looks. It is only your thick muscular curves, bulked up after years of playing rugby, that give you away. But it is not your will that you are the way you are. You are just another shining example of the glorious miracles and creations of our Lord. I applaud you on your charity work in our communities and may you continue to pursue it. I also applaud you on your pursuit of your human rights and I encourage you to be vocal on any issue that touches, encroaches on your rights. This also goes out to the faafatama (lesbian) community in our country." - Samoan Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi to the Faafafine Association of Samoa. "I hope with all of my heart that in some way I have made a difference in the lives of people with AIDS … I want that to be my legacy. Better that than for the mole on my cheek." - A quote from Elizabeth Taylor, who died in March. "In my 19 years, not once have I ever been confronted by an individual who realized independently that I was raised by a gay couple. And you know why? Because the sexual orientation of my parents has had zero affect on the content of my character." - 19-year-old Iowan Zach Wahls goes in to bat for his mothers' right to wed. Jacqui Stanford - 3rd January 2012