Clare Hand
is a self-described flaming London lesbian. She’s invested the very last year currently talking about
queer ladies’ nightlife
in her own city. She files the atmosphere, music, styles, feeling (might you get laid or make brand-new mates?), and people behind the nights.
Clare
chose which would not be straight to only record dyke lifestyle in one town, thus she packed the woman bags and hit the roadway. She’s written about the thriving scenes in
New York
,
Bay Area
, Bogota, São Paulo, Berlin, and Dublin up to now; this listing could keep growing. Monitor her
Dyke Nightlife Diaries
here.
Night One
The initial thing i actually do as I reach a unique town is actually Bing my method to my personal peepsâ»Queer pubs inâ¦,» «Lesbian taverns inâ¦,» «Gay bars in⦠.» Bogotá’s effects happened to be promising, with a lesbian club called Moza and a few gay barsâmainly for the area’s brand new bustling cultural center, Chapinero.
On monday evening, my personal gf and I also whizzed across town in a little yellow cab to Moza. We pulled up, strode out, and found that Moza ended up being no. It sealed down not long ago, explained the protection safeguard at (hetero) club that appears within the aftermath. El Mozo (Moza’s homosexual buddy bar) was just around the corner, so we nipped over truth be told there to track down this had vanished as well.
We decided to recover in a non-gay club; the place ended up being lively with Latin rhythms and passionately Salsa dancing (straight) lovers. Lone dudes, their own breaths nice with aguardiente (Colombia’s nationwide liquor; exactly what tequila is Mexico), was available in mosquito-like droves, each on a mission to retrieve the unclaimed dames. They certainly were all really courteous and comprehended that a no meant no, nevertheless the heteronormative weight contained in this bar was actually lots, specially when we would psyched our selves right up for a night of hanging out with a huge selection of Latin-lesbians.
We soon remaining and went old-school. Flipping on all of our queer-dar, we mooched across streets finding our colleagues. It failed to take very long before we came across (what we decided had been) three other lezzas. We approached and tentatively enquired about Moza and «bar homosexual,» while eying in the duration of their unique fingernails, looking to maybe discover a secret lesbian bar or something like that regarding the sort.
They certainly were really interested in the convo and spoke around for a time about the lackluster lesbian world in their city. Before long, the dykiest-seeming of one’s new staff (who’d been many singing on the subject) left to attend a home party. We were remaining together with the various other two that hasn’t engaged in the gay chat therefore adamantly but were keen to hang aside with us.
âYou wish women?» she requested enthusiastically.
We stated we performed, assuming we were on a gay-level. Off we hopped in a cab, which whisked you away for a great few obstructs before winding up at an inconspicuous doorway in nowhere. Both protection guards (exactly who knew the chaperones) checked us with total bemusement. «Qué?» they said over repeatedly to our tips guide, just as if she had been trying to just take multiple wildebeest into the bar.
We ascended the mirror-covered stair case assuming we were heading as much as a secret queer mecca but quickly realized that we’d already been taken fully to a brothel. Of course there is nothing wrong with brothelsâI’m all for safe areas for gender workers doing their own jobâhowever, the vibe in this particular spot was awful; a handful of ideal males, egos pulsating while they surveyed the bedroom of half-clothed women. Everybody else offered us wondering appearance. They presented the hope that we had been possibly planning purchase or offer sex when all we really wanted were to sip a cerveza and dance to Sylvester. We kept pretty quickly, went home and mulled on the impressive troubles of one’s big gay particular date.
Evening Two
Let us decide to try once again. Theatron, Bogotá’s fourteen-room superclub, is prepared for all, but it’s a homosexual club (getting precise, the greatest gay club during the Western Hemisphere) at heart. At 10 p.m., we had gotten during the 200-people queue, which covered around the location’s belowground carpark like an anaconda. A techno bass thumped from threshold, and everybody jittered with excitement.
As soon as inside the house, we settled 55,000 pesos ($17) and were given just a little plastic glass for unlimited beverages forever. This is exactly one common part of Colombian groups, and possesses an extremely positive impact on the environment around; money and trade are removed from the area, without any risks being plunged into an existential situation when checking their unique lender balance the next morning.
We roamed across venue bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and determined that this isn’t truly a location. Its a village that provides sanctuary to tens of thousands of pleasure-seeking people every week. Personnel orchestrate the space meticulously; herding flocks men and women, keeping stairways complimentary and churning out mixer-after-mixer.
You would require each week during the site to actually get to grips along with it. Home music played inside central open-air place. It is designed like an urban area centre, with elevated DJ decks in the centre and beverage bars, meals shops, and pubs on the borders. There have been about ten DJs each night. They combined countless styles in a variety of unique spaces. Reggaeton played in a chapel, pop in a large amphitheater. Donna Summers played inside psychedelic disco space, Celia Cruz is found on inside the salsa collection, and a DJ flew in from Berlin to take control the techno chamber.
From my observations that night, it seems that various styles attract various quantities of heteronormativity. Salsa and reggaeton had been exactly about the heteros dry-humping underneath the church’s stained glass windowpanes. The pop space ended up being mostly young, jubilant homosexual men flailing their particular arms while they drunkenly serenaded their own pals. Techno appeared to bring in the quintessential renewable lewks (piercings, died-hair, some fetish equipment). It absolutely was the essential queer space, though controlled by tanked gay guys who jumped drugs and de-clothed because the evening evolved.
The majority of people were Latin American; there had been multiple gringos from regional hostels and just a small number of Black men and women. In general, there had been perhaps three other queer femme lovers boating the venue. One duo had matching red and blue-dyed bobs. Another happened to be a Mexican couple I would sat next to from the jet to Bogotáâ we plainly relocate small groups.
We gravitated to the queerness with the techno roo but remaining at about midnight to attend (everything we thought had been) the women’s commodes: a red doorway, a safety guard out front, plus the term «Eve» written above the door.
We realized it was a really glam entrance to a lavatory once we mounted the glittery-pink stair case. Once we hit the leading, we realized this was actually no toilet therefore had unintentionally uncovered a secret lesbian bar. Actually, Bogotá’s only lesbian barâperiod.
The space was actually kitschy: fuchsia pleather sofas, a hot pink club, pop-art paintings of dykons like Ellen, Gwen, Gaga, and Ginger lined the walls. There seemed to be a-pole dancing phase (which was positively being used), an enormous dance-floor, and the only female DJ when you look at the building.
There had been about thirty people inside. Initially we danced in a large kumbaya asexual group, because it was actually cool and not clear who had been queer and who had been just enjoying the femme energy (in a great way).
Since the evening evolved plus the DJ began flowing much more steamy Latin (Reggaeton and dancehall) rhythms within the audience, partners began forming kept, right, and middle. The space soon evolved into exactly what do just be called a clothed live-demo of A-to-Z of one night stand lesbian intercourse positions. Couples new and old happened to be positively opting for it. It had been raw, hedonistic, Sapphic secret.
Though we had been successfully encased in a huge homosexual nightclub, having less doorway policy, better space policy, or active prioritization during the venue’s major entrance created that this selected region proved a blessing for all of us lezzas. This secret lesbian club was actually the only place in the venue in which a lady could hug a woman with no anxiety about opening a close look to a sniveling drunk guy baring his teeth with glee. We accepted the independence of Eve, of the secret lesbian club.
In front from the club (we’d also come in along side it home) endured a large material door, 2 meters by 2 meters (6.5 foot by 6.5 legs), with three door women saying «unicamente por chicas» on perform. The majority of started using it and managed to move on, but tiny batches of men lurked away from gate, ongoing for 5 or 10 minutes, looking at their own tip-toes like aroused meerkats, wanting to sneak-a-peak inside the forbidden area.
Since the time clock hit 3 a.m., we pried our selves from Eve therefore we could discover a lot of site. While carrying out the rounds inside beautiful, sprawling village of hedonism, we found Lotus, a «unicamente hombres» area (presumably enabled to create a safer area for homosexual men to explore out of the mixed crowd). It’s safe to state, there have been no categories of females clambering to have a glance inside there.
We oriented down seriously to the techno room and spent the residual few several hours getting wet with the people. We left at 5 a.m., happy to possess found this truly distinctive place, and even happier to own uncovered Bogotá’s secret lesbian club.
Theatron Calle 58 #10-32, Bogotá, follow
@theatronbogota
.