This week's guest is one of my all-time favorite girlies, the walking ray of sunshine that is Aarthy Lakshmanan (she/her)!Skip ahead to 10:27 if you want to dive right into our conversation!In today's intro I give you a quick little update on what I've been up to during our season break, including a very recent lesson learned about building queer community! I'm back in Mexico City and on a mission to build a queer community for myself, something I've lacked here despite all of the time I've spent here recently. I share a very recent story about how I started to do that recently, hoping it might help any listeners who also find making community in a new place difficult.Aarthy and I then dive into so many great topics!Finding and building queer community (a lovely coincidence given the intro)Pressures of being a queer woman growing up in an Indian familyDifficulties of coming out to immigrant parents and managing expectations of their reactionsThe absolute power of finally being able to speak with another queer person about your experiences and them just getting it...and much more! Share your story:Fill out this formEpisode Links:Follow Aarthy on social media:Instagram: @aarthymusicFollow along with Reaching Out:Podcast's Instagram: @reachingoutpodPodcast's TikTok: @reachingoutpodMichael's Instagram: @michaelwingsit