Clare Give
is a self-described flaming London lesbian. She’s invested the final season authoring
queer ladies’ night life
in her area. She documents the environment, songs, styles, feeling (will you get put or create brand-new mates?), and the ones behind the evenings.
Clare
determined which wouldn’t end up being to merely report dyke night life within one city, so she packed her bags and strike the street. She is written about the thriving views in
Nyc
,
San Francisco
, Bogota, São Paulo, Berlin, and Dublin at this point; this list will keep expanding. Keep close track of her
Dyke Nightlife Diaries
here.
Night One
First thing i really do once I get to a brand new urban area is actually Google my option to my peepsâ»Queer taverns inâ¦,» «Lesbian pubs inâ¦,» «Gay bars in⦠.» Bogotá’s outcomes happened to be encouraging, with a lesbian club also known as Moza and a number of gay barsâmainly into the area’s brand-new bustling cultural hub, Chapinero.
On tuesday night, my personal gf and that I whizzed across town in some yellowish cab to Moza. We pulled up, strode away, and found that Moza had been not much more. It closed down not long ago, revealed the protection shield within (hetero) club that stands with its aftermath. El Mozo (Moza’s homosexual bro bar) was just around the corner, so we nipped over truth be told there to get this had vanished as well.
We decided to recover in a non-gay bar; the site was lively with Latin rhythms and passionately Salsa dance (straight) couples. Lone guys, their particular breaths sweet with aguardiente (Colombia’s nationwide liquor; exactly what tequila would be to Mexico), was available in mosquito-like droves, each on a mission to recover the unclaimed dames. These people were all very polite and recognized that a no implied no, but the heteronormative weight inside bar had been alot, especially when we might psyched our selves upwards for a night of hanging out with a huge selection of latin lesbians.
We soon kept and moved old school. Switching on our queer-dar, we mooched across the streets looking all of our colleagues. It did not take very long before we found (that which we made the decision were) three fellow lezzas. We approached and tentatively enquired about Moza and «bar gay,» while eying up the duration of their unique fingernails, hoping to possibly get a hold of a secret lesbian bar or something like that of the type.
They certainly were very thinking about the convo and spoke with our company for a time about the lackluster lesbian world within town. Before long, the dykiest-seeming in our brand new staff (who would been more vocal on the topic) remaining to go to a property celebration. We had been remaining together with the various other two who’dn’t involved with the gay talk thus adamantly but had been keen to hang away with our company.
âYou desire girls?» she requested eagerly.
We said we did, assuming we had been on a gay-level. Off we hopped in a cab, which whisked all of us out for an effective few blocks before winding up at an inconspicuous entrance in the center of no place. The two protection guards (who understood the chaperones) considered united states with complete bemusement. «Qué?» they said continuously to the guide, as though she was actually wanting to simply take a few wildebeest to the bar.
We ascended the mirror-covered staircase presuming we were proceeding to a secret queer mecca but quickly realized we’d already been taken fully to a brothel. Without a doubt there’s nothing incorrect with brothelsâi am all for secure areas for gender staff members to accomplish their jobâhowever, the vibe in this location had been bad; a number of suited guys, egos pulsating while they surveyed the area of half-clothed women. Everybody else provided us wondering looks. They conducted the expectation we happened to be either going to purchase or sell gender whenever all we really desired was to sip a cerveza and party to Sylvester. We left fairly quickly, wandered home and mulled on the epic problem of our own huge gay date.
Evening Two
Let us try again. Theatron, Bogotá’s fourteen-room superclub, is prepared for all, but it’s a gay club (becoming accurate, the biggest homosexual dance club within the Western Hemisphere) in your mind. At 10 p.m., we got in 200-people waiting line, which wrapped round the site’s underground carpark like an anaconda. A techno bass thumped from the roof, and everyone jittered with exhilaration.
When in, we paid 55,000 pesos ($17) and got a tiny bit synthetic glass for limitless products all night long. This is certainly a typical part of Colombian organizations, and it has a very good effect on the environment inside; money and change are taken off the space, without one concerns getting plunged into an existential crisis when checking their own lender stability next early morning.
We roamed round the venue bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and concluded that this is not actually a place. It’s a village that offers haven to a great deal of pleasure-seeking folks every week. Employees orchestrate the room meticulously; herding flocks of people, keeping stairways free of charge and churning out mixer-after-mixer.
You would need per week inside the place to essentially will grips with-it. Residence songs played during the central open-air location. Its created like a town middle, with elevated DJ decks in the middle and beverage pubs, food shops, and pubs on their outskirts. There have been at the very least ten DJs every night. They mixed countless types in various distinct spaces. Reggaeton played in a chapel, enter an enormous amphitheater. Donna Summers played into the psychedelic disco area, Celia Cruz is on when you look at the salsa suite, and a DJ travelled in from Berlin to take over the techno chamber.
From my personal findings that evening, it appears that various genres attract various levels of heteronormativity. Salsa and reggaeton had been all about the heteros dry-humping in chapel’s tarnished glass house windows. The pop space had been mostly youthful, jubilant homosexual dudes flailing their hands while they drunkenly serenaded their friends. Techno did actually draw in the most alternate lewks (piercings, died-hair, some fetish equipment). It actually was the absolute most queer space, though ruled by tanked homosexual dudes which popped pills and de-clothed while the evening evolved.
A lot of people happened to be Latin American; there have been a few gringos from regional hostels and only a few Black men and women. All in all, there are maybe three other queer femme lovers going swimming the venue. One duo had corresponding reddish and blue-dyed bobs. Another happened to be a Mexican pair I would sat close to about airplane to Bogotáâ we plainly move around in tiny sectors.
We gravitated into queerness with the techno roo but remaining at about midnight to go to (that which we thought was) the women’s lavatories: a pink doorway, a security protect out top, and also the term «Eve» created above the home.
We thought it was an extremely glam entry to a lavatory even as we mounted the glittery-pink stair case. When we hit the leading, we realised that this ended up being no bathroom and in addition we had accidentally discovered a secret lesbian club. In fact, Bogotá’s just lesbian barâperiod.
The space had been 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 is a pole dance period (that was undoubtedly being used), a huge dance-floor, therefore the sole female DJ in building.
There have been about thirty people in there. To start with everyone danced in a huge kumbaya asexual group, since it had been cool and not clear who had been queer and who was simply just experiencing the femme power (in an effective way).
Since the evening advanced therefore the DJ started flowing a lot more passionate Latin (Reggaeton and dancehall) rhythms on the audience, partners started building remaining, appropriate, and center. The room soon turned into exactly what can simply be referred to as a clothed live-demo on the A-to-Z of standing up lesbian sex opportunities. Couples new and old happened to be definitely opting for it. It actually was raw, hedonistic, Sapphic magic.
Though we had been successfully encased in a massive homosexual nightclub, the deficiency of home plan, safer space plan, or effective prioritization at the location’s major entry meant this selected location showed a blessing for people lezzas. This key lesbian bar had been the only invest the location in which a woman could kiss a female without the concern with opening an eye to a sniveling intoxicated guy baring their teeth with glee. We accepted the freedom of Eve, associated with key lesbian club.
At the front end of this club (we would can be found in along side it door) stood a big metal entrance, 2 yards by 2 yards (6.5 foot by 6.5 feet), with three doorway ladies saying «unicamente por chicas» on perform. Many started using it and moved on, but small batches of men lurked outside the gate, lingering for 5 or 10 minutes, standing on their particular tip-toes like sexy meerkats, trying to sneak-a-peak from inside the restricted area.
Given that clock struck 3 a.m., we pried our selves far from Eve therefore we could enjoy more of the location. While carrying out the rounds in this stunning, sprawling town of hedonism, we found Lotus, a «solo hombres» place (apparently made to create a safer space for homosexual men to understand more about off the mixed audience). It is safe to say, there have been no sets of ladies clambering getting a look inside truth be told there.
We went right down to the techno place and invested the remaining couple of several hours getting flushed with this men and women. We left at 5 a.m., pleased to own located this genuinely special place, and even happier to possess uncovered Bogotá’s secret lesbian bar.
Theatron Calle 58 #10-32, Bogotá, practice
@theatronbogota
.