Clare Hand
is actually a self-described flaming London lesbian. She is spent the past year writing about
queer ladies’ nightlife
within her urban area. She documents the atmosphere, music, trends, feeling (might you get put or make brand new mates?), and those behind the evenings.
Clare
chose so it won’t end up being straight to only document dyke nightlife in one single town, thus she packed the woman bags and hit the road. She’s discussed the thriving moments in
New York
,
San Francisco Bay Area
, Bogota, São Paulo, Berlin, and Dublin so far; this listing could keep broadening. Keep close track of the woman
Dyke Nightlife Diaries
right here.
Night One
To begin with I do while I will an innovative new town is actually Bing my way to my peepsâ”Queer bars inâ¦,” “Lesbian bars inâ¦,” “Gay bars in⦠.” Bogotá’s outcomes happened to be promising, with a lesbian club also known as Moza and a number of gay barsâmainly in city’s new active cultural center, Chapinero.
On Friday night, my gf and I whizzed anywhere in a tiny bit yellowish taxi to Moza. We pulled upwards, strode out, and discovered that Moza had been you can forget. It closed down not long ago, described the protection protect on (hetero) club that appears within its wake. El Mozo (Moza’s gay buddy club) was coming, so we nipped over there discover so it had vanished as well.
We chose to recoup in a non-gay club; the venue had been lively with Latin rhythms and passionately Salsa dancing (right) couples. Lone guys, their breaths sweet with aguardiente (Colombia’s national alcohol; just what tequila is to Mexico), came in mosquito-like droves, each on a mission to recover the unclaimed dames. They were all very courteous and comprehended that a no designed no, nevertheless heteronormative weight contained in this club was a great deal, particularly when we might psyched our selves up for every night of partying with countless Latin-lesbians.
We eventually kept and moved old-school. Switching on the queer-dar, we mooched across the streets trying to find our peers. It don’t take very long before we stumbled across (whatever you made the decision happened to be) three other lezzas. We approached and tentatively enquired about Moza and “bar gay,” while eying in the duration of their own nails, aspiring to perhaps discover a secret lesbian bar or something of the kind.
They were very thinking about the convo and talked with us for a while towards lackluster lesbian scene inside their area. Eventually, the dykiest-seeming of our new team (who’d already been the quintessential singing on the topic) remaining to visit a residence party. We were remaining aided by the other two who’dn’t engaged in the gay cam very adamantly but happened to be eager to hang on with our company.
âYou want ladies?” she requested enthusiastically.
We stated we performed, assuming we had been on a gay-level. Off we hopped in a cab, which whisked united states away for a beneficial couple of blocks before winding up at an inconspicuous doorway in the center of no place. The two protection protections (exactly who realized the chaperones) looked at united states with total bemusement. “Qué?” they stated over and over repeatedly to your guide, just as if she had been trying to get a couple of wildebeest to the bar.
We ascended the mirror-covered stair case presuming we had been proceeding doing a key queer mecca but quickly realized that people’d been taken up a brothel. Without a doubt there is nothing completely wrong with brothelsâI’m all for secure areas for intercourse workers to do their own jobâhowever, the ambiance in this particular place was actually terrible; a small number of appropriate men, egos throbbing as they surveyed the room of scantily clad women. Everybody offered united states curious appearances. They conducted the hope that we happened to be either planning buy or promote intercourse when all we really wished would be to sip a cerveza and dance to Sylvester. We remaining pretty easily, stepped home and mulled during the impressive troubles of our own huge homosexual date.
Night Two
Let’s attempt once again. Theatron, Bogotá’s fourteen-room superclub, is actually open to all, but it is a gay pub (to be accurate, the greatest gay club when you look at the american Hemisphere) in mind. At 10 p.m., we got when you look at the 200-people waiting line, which wrapped round the site’s underground car park like an anaconda. A techno bass thumped from threshold, and everyone jittered with enjoyment.
As soon as around, we paid 55,000 pesos ($17) and received a tiny bit plastic mug for endless drinks forever. This might be a common thing in Colombian groups, and it has a really positive effect on the environment internally; money and exchange are taken out of the room, no any risks getting plunged into an existential situation when checking their particular lender stability next early morning.
We roamed all over place bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and determined that this isn’t actually a place. It is a village which provides sanctuary to many pleasure-seeking individuals every week. Personnel orchestrate the area meticulously; herding flocks of people, keeping stairways cost-free and churning out mixer-after-mixer.
You would need a week for the place to truly arrive at grips with it. Residence music played from inside the main open-air place. Its designed like a town center, with elevated DJ porches in the centre and cocktail bars, meals stores, and pubs on its outskirts. There have been at least ten DJs each night. They mixed numerous genres in a variety of unique spaces. Reggaeton played in a chapel, enter a large amphitheater. Donna Summers played inside the psychedelic disco space, Celia Cruz is found on into the salsa package, and a DJ travelled in from Berlin to take control the techno chamber.
From my personal observations that evening, it would appear that various genres attract various levels of heteronormativity. Salsa and reggaeton happened to be all about the heteros dry-humping according to the chapel’s stained glass house windows. The pop music space was actually primarily young, jubilant homosexual dudes flailing their unique arms while they drunkenly serenaded their own pals. Techno appeared to draw in probably the most alternative lewks (piercings, died-hair, some fetish gear). It absolutely was the absolute most queer room, though reigned over by tanked gay dudes who popped pills and de-clothed given that evening developed.
The majority of people happened to be Latin American; there were some gringos from regional hostels and just a handful of Black men and women. On the whole, there were maybe three additional queer femme lovers going swimming the site. One duo had matching red-colored and blue-dyed bobs. Another happened to be a Mexican couple I would sat close to on plane to Bogotáâ we obviously move in small groups.
We gravitated into queerness for the techno roo but remaining around midnight to attend (everything we believed was) the women’s commodes: a red doorway, a security guard out top, and the term “Eve” authored over the doorway.
We realized it was a really glam entry to a lavatory even as we mounted the glittery-pink stairway. Whenever we strike the top, we realised this ended up being no lavatory so we had accidentally found a secret lesbian bar. Indeed, Bogotá’s just lesbian barâperiod.
The room was actually kitschy: fuchsia pleather sofas, a hot red bar, pop-art mural art of dykons like Ellen, Gwen, Gaga, and Ginger lined the wall space. There was clearly a pole dancing level (that was absolutely becoming utilised), a large dance-floor, additionally the only female DJ from inside the building.
There had been about thirty folks in there. In the beginning most of us danced in a big kumbaya asexual group, since it ended up being cool and ambiguous who had been queer and who was simply simply experiencing the femme electricity (in a great way).
As evening developed and also the DJ began pouring more passionate Latin (Reggaeton and dancehall) rhythms within the audience, lovers began developing remaining, appropriate, and heart. The area eventually evolved into what can just be called a clothed live-demo associated with the A-to-Z of standing up lesbian gender opportunities. Couples brand new and old had been completely going for it. It had been natural, hedonistic, Sapphic magic.
Though we were effectively encased in a huge gay nightclub, having less doorway plan, safer room plan, or productive prioritization at the site’s major entrance meant this particular selected location proved a godsend for all of us lezzas. This secret lesbian club ended up being the actual only real set in the place where a lady could hug a lady without having the fear of starting a close look to a sniveling drunk guy baring their teeth with glee. We accepted the liberty of Eve, with the secret lesbian bar.
In front of club (we’d can be found in the side door) endured a big metal gate, 2 yards by 2 meters (6.5 foot by 6.5 legs), with three door women saying “unicamente por chicas” on recurring. Many first got it and shifted, but little batches of men lurked outside of the entrance, lingering for 5 or ten minutes, sitting on their tip-toes like slutty meerkats, wanting to sneak-a-peak within the restricted region.
Given that time clock struck 3 a.m., we pried our selves from Eve therefore we could enjoy more of the location. While carrying out the rounds within this breathtaking, sprawling town of hedonism, we came across Lotus, a “unicamente hombres” area (apparently enabled to make a safer room for gay dudes to understand more about off the mixed group). Truly safe to express, there had been no categories of ladies clambering getting a peek inside truth be told there.
We headed right down to the techno place and invested the remaining couple of hours obtaining flushed with this individuals. We remaining at 5 a.m., happy having discovered this genuinely special site, plus more content having revealed Bogotá’s key lesbian bar.
Theatron Calle 58 #10-32, Bogotá, follow
@theatronbogota
.