Clare Hand
is a self-described flaming London lesbian. She is invested the final year currently talking about
queer women’s night life
within her urban area. She documents the environment, music, trends, vibe (are you going to get laid or generate brand new friends?), and those behind the nights.

Clare
made the decision it would not be right to merely report dyke night life in one single town, so she packed her handbags and strike the road. She actually is written about the thriving views in
New York
,
San Francisco Bay Area
, Bogota, São Paulo, Berlin, and Dublin at this point; this record will keep broadening. Keep close track of the woman
Dyke Nightlife Diaries
here.

Evening One

The first thing I do whenever I will a unique city is Bing my personal option to my peeps—”Queer taverns in…,” “Lesbian pubs in…,” “Gay bars in… .” Bogotá’s outcomes were encouraging, with a lesbian club known as Moza and a number of homosexual bars—mainly for the city’s brand-new active social hub, Chapinero.

On Friday evening, my girlfriend and I also whizzed anywhere in somewhat yellow cab to Moza. We pulled upwards, strode away, and discovered that Moza was forget about. It sealed down a while ago, revealed the protection protect in the (hetero) bar that stands within the wake. El Mozo (Moza’s homosexual sibling bar) had been just around the corner, so we nipped over here to acquire this had vanished too.

We decided to recover in a non-gay bar; the place was lively with Latin rhythms and passionately Salsa dance (straight) couples. Lone guys, their unique breaths sweet with aguardiente (Colombia’s national alcohol; just what tequila is Mexico), came in mosquito-like droves, each on a mission to retrieve the unclaimed dames. These people were all extremely courteous and understood that a no suggested no, nevertheless heteronormative fat within club ended up being alot, particularly when we would psyched ourselves right up for per night of partying with numerous Latin-lesbians.

We eventually kept and moved old school. Turning on the queer-dar, we mooched across roads seeking all of our colleagues. It don’t take very long before we stumbled across (everything we made the decision were) three fellow lezzas. We approached and tentatively enquired about Moza and “bar homosexual,” while eying up the period of their fingernails, hoping to perhaps find a secret lesbian club or something for the type.

They certainly were very interested in the convo and talked with our team for a while concerning the lackluster lesbian world within town. Eventually, the dykiest-seeming your brand-new crew (who’d already been the most singing on the topic) kept to visit a residence celebration. We were remaining using the other two who hadn’t engaged in the homosexual cam thus adamantly but were eager to hang out with us.

‘You want women?” she questioned enthusiastically.

We mentioned we performed, presuming we were on a gay-level. Off we hopped in a cab, which whisked you out for good few obstructs before winding up at an inconspicuous doorway in nowhere. The 2 security protections (whom realized our chaperones) looked over us with utter bemusement. “Qué?” they said over and over to our guide, as though she ended up being trying to simply take a few wildebeest to the bar.

We ascended the mirror-covered staircase presuming we had been proceeding doing a secret queer mecca but quickly realised that we’d been taken to a brothel. Without a doubt there’s nothing completely wrong with brothels—i am all for secure rooms for gender workers to do their particular job—however, the feeling in this particular spot had been terrible; a number of ideal males, egos pulsating while they surveyed the room of half-clothed women. Everyone else gave you interested appearances. They held the hope that we were either likely to purchase or promote intercourse whenever all we actually desired were to sip a cerveza and party to Sylvester. We remaining rather rapidly, strolled house and mulled during the epic failure of our big homosexual particular date.

Night Two

Why don’t we decide to try once more. Theatron, Bogotá’s fourteen-room superclub, is actually prepared for all, but it is a gay nightclub (to be precise, the largest homosexual dance club when you look at the american Hemisphere) in your mind. At 10 p.m., we had gotten into the 200-people waiting line, which wrapped all over venue’s underground carpark like an anaconda. A techno bass thumped through the ceiling, and everyone jittered with enjoyment.

Once inside the house, we paid 55,000 pesos ($17) and got a tiny bit plastic mug for limitless drinks forever. This really is a standard thing in Colombian organizations, and has now a truly positive effect on the environment in; money and change tend to be taken off the area, and no any concerns getting plunged into an existential situation when examining their bank stability the second morning.

We roamed across place bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and concluded that this is simply not truly a place. Its a village that provides refuge to many pleasure-seeking people every week. Team orchestrate the room meticulously; herding flocks of men and women, keeping stairways free and churning out mixer-after-mixer.

You’ll require weekly in the site to truly arrive at grips along with it. House songs played when you look at the main open-air place. It is created like a town middle, with increased DJ porches at the center and cocktail bars, food shops, and pubs on their outskirts. There were at the least ten DJs each night. They blended countless styles in several distinctive areas. Reggaeton played in a chapel, pop in a large amphitheater. Donna Summers played in psychedelic disco area, Celia Cruz is on when you look at the salsa room, and a DJ flew in from Berlin to take control the techno chamber.

From my personal findings that evening, it seems that various types draw in different levels of heteronormativity. Salsa and reggaeton were exactly about the heteros dry-humping within the chapel’s stained glass windowpanes. The pop space was actually mostly youthful, jubilant gay dudes flailing their unique hands as they drunkenly serenaded their pals. Techno seemed to entice the quintessential alternate lewks (piercings, died-hair, some fetish equipment). It absolutely was the quintessential queer space, though ruled by tanked homosexual guys whom popped tablets and de-clothed since the night developed.

The majority of people were Latin-American; there had been many gringos from local hostels and simply a few dark people. All in all, there are perhaps three various other queer femme couples going swimming the place. One duo had matching red and blue-dyed bobs. Another had been a Mexican couple I would sat close to throughout the jet to Bogotá— we plainly move in tiny sectors.

We gravitated on queerness with the techno roo but kept around midnight to attend (everything we thought was) the women’s commodes: a pink doorway, a protection safeguard out front side, plus the word “Eve” composed above the doorway.

We figured it was an extremely glam access to a toilet while we mounted the glittery-pink stairway. Once we strike the leading, we realized this was actually no lavatory and we had unintentionally uncovered a secret lesbian bar. In fact, Bogotá’s just lesbian bar—period.

The space was actually kitschy: fuchsia pleather couches, a hot green club, pop-art mural art of dykons like Ellen, Gwen, Gaga, and Ginger lined the wall space. There clearly was a-pole dance stage (that was undoubtedly becoming used), a big dance-floor, in addition to only female DJ when you look at the building.

There have been around thirty people in there. At first everyone danced in a large kumbaya asexual circle, given that it had been cool and not clear who was simply queer and who was simply just enjoying the femme electricity (in an effective way).

Once the evening advanced plus the DJ started pouring much more passionate Latin (Reggaeton and dancehall) rhythms on the crowd, partners started developing left, appropriate, and hub. The space shortly turned into exactly what do just be described as a clothed live-demo of the A-to-Z of standing lesbian intercourse roles. Couples brand new and old had been positively going for it. It actually was raw, hedonistic, Sapphic secret.

Though we had been successfully encased in an enormous gay club, having less door policy, better area policy, or effective prioritization during the place’s major entrance implied that specified area showed a blessing for people lezzas. This key lesbian club ended up being truly the only place in the venue in which a female could kiss a female minus the concern about starting an eye fixed to a sniveling intoxicated guy baring their teeth with glee. We embraced the liberty of Eve, regarding the secret lesbian bar.

In front associated with bar (we might also come in the medial side door) stood a giant metal gate, 2 yards by 2 meters (6.5 foot by 6.5 legs), with three doorway females saying “solo por chicas” on recurring. Most got it and shifted, but tiny batches of men lurked outside the entrance, lingering for 5 or 10 minutes, standing on their tip-toes like naughty meerkats, attempting to sneak-a-peak inside the restricted area.

Due to the fact time clock struck 3 a.m., we pried our selves from Eve so we could experience more of the place. While undertaking the rounds within this gorgeous, sprawling town of hedonism, we came across Lotus, a “solamente hombres” area (presumably designed to make a safer room for gay dudes to understand more about from the mixed group). Truly safe to say, there were no categories of women clambering to possess a look inside truth be told there.

We headed down seriously to the techno space and invested the remaining number of many hours obtaining sweaty with these people. We kept at 5 a.m., pleased for found this genuinely distinctive location, and even more happy to possess uncovered Bogotá’s secret lesbian bar.

Theatron Calle 58 #10-32, Bogotá, practice
@theatronbogota
.