Clare Give
is a self-described flaming London lesbian. She actually is spent the last year authoring
queer women’s nightlife
within her town. She files the environment, music, fashions, vibe (are you going to get set or create new friends?), and the ones behind the nights.
Clare
chose this wouldn’t end up being directly to just document dyke night life in one urban area, therefore she stuffed the woman bags and smack the roadway. She actually is discussing the thriving moments in
Ny
,
Bay Area
, Bogota, São Paulo, Berlin, and Dublin up to now; this listing could keep growing. Keep an eye on the woman
Dyke Nightlife Diaries
here.
Night One
The very first thing i really do while I arrive at a fresh city is actually Google my personal method to my peepsâ”Queer pubs inâ¦,” “Lesbian bars inâ¦,” “Gay bars in⦠.” Bogotá’s results were encouraging, with a lesbian nightclub labeled as Moza and a small number of homosexual barsâmainly for the town’s new busy cultural center, Chapinero.
On tuesday night, my personal gf and that I whizzed anywhere in somewhat yellowish cab to Moza. We pulled up, strode out, and unearthed that Moza had been forget about. It sealed down not long ago, revealed the safety guard at (hetero) bar that appears with its aftermath. El Mozo (Moza’s gay cousin bar) was actually just around the corner, therefore we nipped over there to track down which had vanished too.
We chose to recover in a non-gay club; the location was actually live with Latin rhythms and passionately Salsa dance (right) lovers. Lone guys, their own breaths nice with aguardiente (Colombia’s national alcohol; what tequila should Mexico), came in mosquito-like droves, each on a mission to recover the unclaimed dames. These people were all extremely polite and understood that a no suggested no, although heteronormative fat contained in this bar had been loads, specially when we might psyched our selves up for per night of hanging out with a huge selection of Latin-lesbians.
We shortly left and went old school. Switching on our very own queer-dar, we mooched round the roadways wanting our peers. It didn’t take very long before we found (what we decided happened to be) three fellow lezzas. We approached and tentatively enquired about Moza and “bar gay,” while eying up the amount of their particular nails, looking to perhaps get a hold of a secret lesbian club or something of this type.
These were very interested in the convo and spoke with us for some time about the lackluster lesbian world inside their urban area. Eventually, the dykiest-seeming your brand new team (who would also been the essential singing on the subject) left to attend a property celebration. We were kept aided by the additional two who’dn’t involved with the homosexual talk therefore adamantly but were keen to hold away around.
âYou want ladies?” she questioned enthusiastically.
We said we did, assuming we were on a gay-level. Off we hopped in a taxi, which whisked us away for good couple of obstructs before winding up at an inconspicuous doorway in the exact middle of no place. Both safety guards (just who knew our very own chaperones) looked over us with total bemusement. “Qué?” they stated continuously to our manual, like she ended up being attempting to just take a couple of wildebeest inside club.
We ascended the mirror-covered stairway presuming we had been proceeding up to a secret queer mecca but soon realised we’d already been taken fully to a brothel. Naturally there is nothing wrong with brothelsâi am all for secure places for gender employees to accomplish their own jobâhowever, the vibe in this destination was actually terrible; a number of ideal men, egos pulsating as they surveyed the bedroom of scantily clad females. Everyone offered you inquisitive appearance. They conducted the expectation we had been both going to get or offer intercourse whenever all we really wanted were to sip a cerveza and dance to Sylvester. We remaining very quickly, stepped house and mulled over the impressive troubles your huge gay date.
Evening Two
Why don’t we decide to try once more. Theatron, Bogotá’s fourteen-room superclub, is ready to accept all, but it’s a gay nightclub (is exact, the largest gay pub during the american Hemisphere) at heart. At 10 p.m., we had gotten during the 200-people queue, which wrapped around the location’s belowground car parking like an anaconda. A techno bass thumped from threshold, and everybody jittered with excitement.
As soon as inside, we paid 55,000 pesos ($17) and were given a little synthetic cup for unlimited drinks through the night. This is a common part of Colombian organizations, and contains a really good influence on the atmosphere in; cash and trade tend to be taken out of the space, no any risks becoming plunged into an existential situation when checking their unique lender stability the second early morning.
We roamed around the site bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and figured this is not really a place. It is a village which provides haven to a huge number of pleasure-seeking men and women weekly. Team orchestrate the space meticulously; herding flocks of people, maintaining stairways cost-free and churning out mixer-after-mixer.
You’ll need per week in the place to essentially can grips along with it. House songs played in main open-air area. It is designed like a town hub, with elevated DJ decks in the centre and cocktail taverns, food stores, and pubs on the borders. There had been about ten DJs each night. They combined many types in various distinct areas. Reggaeton played in a chapel, pop in a large amphitheater. Donna Summers played inside the psychedelic disco room, Celia Cruz is found on from inside the salsa package, and a DJ travelled in from Berlin to take-over the techno chamber.
From my observations that evening, it appears that various types attract different amounts of heteronormativity. Salsa and reggaeton had been exactly about the heteros dry-humping under the chapel’s tarnished cup windows. The pop room was mostly younger, jubilant homosexual guys flailing their unique arms because they drunkenly serenaded their unique friends. Techno seemed to bring in more renewable lewks (piercings, died-hair, some fetish equipment). It had been the absolute most queer room, though ruled by tanked gay men whom popped tablets and de-clothed because night evolved.
Many people happened to be Latin-American; there have been certain gringos from regional hostels and only a few dark people. In general, there had been maybe three some other queer femme couples floating around the place. One duo had matching red and blue-dyed bobs. Another happened to be a Mexican couple I would sat next to regarding the jet to Bogotáâ we demonstrably move around in little circles.
We gravitated towards the queerness from the techno roo but left around midnight to attend (whatever you thought was actually) the ladies’s commodes: a red entrance, a security safeguard out front side, additionally the word “Eve” authored over the home.
We realized this is a really glam entrance to a toilet once we mounted the glittery-pink stair case. Once we smack the very top, we realised that the was no bathroom therefore had accidentally uncovered a secret lesbian club. Indeed, Bogotá’s only lesbian barâperiod.
The area ended up being kitschy: fuchsia pleather sofas, a hot green bar, pop-art mural art of dykons like Ellen, Gwen, Gaga, and Ginger lined the wall space. There is a pole dance level (which was surely being used), a massive dance-floor, together with just feminine DJ for the building.
There are about thirty people inside. In the beginning we danced in a large kumbaya asexual circle, given that it had been cold and uncertain who had been queer and who was simply only experiencing the femme power (in an effective way).
Since evening evolved together with DJ began pouring more passionate Latin (Reggaeton and dancehall) rhythms on the group, lovers began forming kept, appropriate, and hub. The space eventually turned into so what can just be called a clothed live-demo of the A-to-Z of standing lesbian gender opportunities. Couples brand new and outdated happened to be completely choosing it. It absolutely was natural, hedonistic, Sapphic miracle.
Though we were effortlessly encased in an enormous homosexual nightclub, having less door policy, less dangerous room plan, or effective prioritization from the location’s major entry created that this selected place proved a godsend for us lezzas. This key lesbian bar had been really the only set in the venue where a female could kiss a woman without the concern about beginning an eye fixed to a sniveling intoxicated guy baring his teeth with glee. We embraced the liberty of Eve, regarding the secret lesbian bar.
At the front regarding the bar (we might also come in the side doorway) stood a giant metal gate, 2 meters by 2 yards (6.5 legs by 6.5 legs), with three doorway women saying “solo por chicas” on repeat. Most got it and shifted, but little batches of guys lurked beyond your door, lingering for five or ten full minutes, looking at their own tip-toes like sexy meerkats, wanting to sneak-a-peak within the restricted territory.
Because clock hit 3 a.m., we pried our selves from the Eve therefore we could enjoy a lot of place. While undertaking the rounds within stunning, sprawling town of hedonism, we stumbled across Lotus, a “solamente hombres” area (apparently built to generate a safer space for homosexual dudes to understand more about out of the mixed group). It really is secure to state, there had been no sets of females clambering having a look inside truth be told there.
We headed down seriously to the techno room and spent the remaining number of many hours getting wet with these individuals. We kept at 5 a.m., delighted having discovered this genuinely unique location, as well as more happy to have revealed Bogotá’s key lesbian club.
Theatron Calle 58 #10-32, Bogotá, practice
@theatronbogota
.