Lifting up their wrist, Zahra Haider talks about one of their many tattoos. They trace their fingertips across the Urdu scripture inked into their skin, spelling out the word “freedom.” Sitting in Montreal’s La Fontaine Park on a spring afternoon, it was one of only a few times the 28-year-old has explained the tattoo’s significance to people who can actually read the language since moving here from Toronto a year and a half ago. It’s an experience they didn’t expect when attending a gathering for queer people of colour, organized through a community Haider had found on Facebook. “I mean Montreal is very white, you know,” they said. “The desi [South Asian] community here is very small, let alone the queer South Asian community. So yeah, it was definitely really nice to meet other queer South Asians there.”