Vulnerability is a Strength
Out There
Willow Belden
4.6 • 608 Ratings
🗓️ 20 May 2021
⏱️ 31 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Climbing a mountain can be a lot like coming out.
That's a metaphor filmmaker Devin Fei-Fan Tau explores in his new documentary Who's On Top. The film follows four LGBTQ climbers who set out to summit Mt. Hood. It explores their connection to nature and their efforts to challenge stereotypes about gender and sexuality — and it offers an inside view into the literal and metaphorical mountains they face.
Devin joins us on this episode to talk about it.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Okay, time for a pop quiz. How many mountains are there in the world? Any guesses? |
| 0:08.2 | Turns out there are 1,187,049 peaks that have names, and even more if you count the ones that don't have names. |
| 0:18.2 | If you're anything like me, you probably like to know what mountains you're looking at |
| 0:22.5 | when you're out on an adventure. But a lot of times, it's kind of hard to figure it out, because |
| 0:28.7 | hiking maps usually only show the immediate area you're in. Lucky for us, there's an app out there |
| 0:35.8 | that can help. It's called PeakVisor. |
| 0:39.5 | PeakVisor is one of our sponsors for this episode. Their app provides mountain names, elevation, |
| 0:47.1 | distance, and a ton of extra information on more than a million summits all over the world. |
| 0:53.8 | The way it works is that wherever you're standing, |
| 0:57.0 | you just open up the app and it'll provide you with a panoramic picture of what you're seeing, |
| 1:01.7 | with all the peaks labeled. |
| 1:04.2 | Check out PeakVisor in the app store. |
| 1:06.9 | You just might love it. |
| 1:14.7 | Thank you. You just might love it. Hi, I'm Willow Belden, and you're listening to Out There, |
| 1:19.1 | the podcast that explores big questions through intimate stories outdoors. |
| 1:25.3 | Growing up in suburban L.A., Devin Ffantau didn't have much access to the outdoors. |
| 1:32.3 | His family didn't take him camping or backpacking, but he knew his classmates did things like that. |
| 1:38.9 | He saw outdoorsy people on TV, and he wanted in on it. He felt this draw to the outdoors. |
| 1:47.0 | As he got older and was able to spend more time outside, nature became his happy place. |
| 1:53.8 | Growing up gay and being in the closet, there was always a sense of not belonging. |
| 2:07.4 | You know, nature doesn't discriminate. Nature doesn't judge. |
| 2:17.2 | And so even though everybody else is judging us and judging ourselves, but that's definitely like an opportunity where we could go and escape. |
... |
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