Evans was raised as a Mormon, but had struggles with expressing his gay identity at Brigham Young University.[3][5] In an article for Outsports, Evans discussed the compulsory year of conversion therapy and "traumatic moments" BYU made him undergo in the late 90s as a student after he was caught kissing a man by his roommate. BYU told him he could be expelled or visit weekly with his bishop, turn in fellow gay students, cut off contact with any gay friends, and have frequent visits with a BYU therapist until he was heterosexual and "safe" for other students to be around. Included in the therapy was weekly dates with women as an additional attempt to change his attractions.[5]
He got his Master's degree at Oxford University where he studied Geography and Russian Foreign Policy.[3]
Career
Evans began working for National Geographic Traveler on a real-time digital story-telling assignment in 2009 on an assignment called "Bus to Antarctica". He traveled overland from Washington DC to Tierra del Fuego by bus and the last leg to Antarctica by boat.[6] When Evans reached the island of South Georgia, he encountered a black emperor penguin, which was described to be as rare as "one in a zillion".[7] It later became the namesake of his 2017 travel memoir The Black Penguin, which expands upon his blog posts and tweets and includes insights from Evans about his struggles regarding family, religion, and sexuality,[8] The memoir received a Stonewall Book Award honor.[4][9]
He was given the moniker of National Geographic's "digital nomad",[10] as he continued on other assignments, and also contributed to the compilation book Four Seasons of Travel.[11][12][13][14]
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