"I thought it was just a phase. I thought there was something wrong with gay people, so I didn't want to be like that." These are the thoughts of a young William Bily as he grew up in the United States in the 1980s. William's mother is Slovakian Romani but his father is not. They emigrated to the United States during the Prague Spring in 1968.

When he was 18 years old, William moved from a small town in Ohio to New York for college. Although NYC is really open to queer people, he had no need to be part of the gay community. In fact, he tried to avoid it. William kept his mind constantly occupied by focusing on school, studying, and working hard on his future career. He saw girls as part of his family rather than something romantic, he kept thinking: "It's just a phase, maybe I'll get a girlfriend after school."

When William was in his early 20s, he started having experiences with other men, he thought: "Okay, maybe it's not just a phase, I'm gay." But he didn't want to tell his friends because he knew they would make fun of him. When he was 22, he moved to Prague and started exploring his sexuality. Being so far away from his hometown gave him a special kind of freedom and the ability to be honest with himself. He had his first long-term relationship with a man, which was also his first painful breakup.

In the U.S. he was an ordinary guy with a Romani background, in Prague he had to hide his Romani background and found himself in another box because he was treated as white in society. He could have been more open about being gay, but it's harder to be gay in the Roma community. This was frustrating because he always found he had something to hide depending on which group of people he wanted to interact with. In 2000, he moved to Chicago for his master's degree and found a safe space where people were more interested in queer people and he could finally be himself without hiding anything. After that experience, he never wanted to go back into any box.

William traveled the world where he met other international Roma who happened to also be gay, so he finally felt accepted by his community. He felt more confident. He realised that he was not the first or last Roma who was also gay, which led to further realisation that it was important to talk about it because others needed to see that they were not the only ones and could feel normal about themselves because of it.

In his 30s, he came out to his mother and said he was going to bring home a guy who was really important to him. After the visit, William got a letter from his mother saying, "It's no good because he's older than you." Even though at the time his boyfriend was only four years older. A few more weeks passed and his mother made it through, as did his sister and brother. Eventually, his father found out, too. The subject was not broached more than once, it was simply accepted.