Clare Hand
is a self-described flaming London lesbian. She actually is invested the very last year currently talking about
queer ladies nightlife
within her area. She files the environment, music, trends, vibe (might you get put or make new mates?), and people behind the evenings.

Clare
decided so it wouldn’t end up being straight to only document dyke lifestyle within one town, so she packed her bags and hit the path. She actually is discussing the thriving scenes in
New York
,
San Francisco Bay Area
, Bogota, São Paulo, Berlin, and Dublin up to now; this record helps to keep growing. Keep an eye on the woman
Dyke Nightlife Diaries
right here.

Night One

To begin with i actually do when I reach a brand new town is actually Google my personal method to my peeps—”Queer pubs in…,” “Lesbian pubs in…,” “Gay bars in… .” Bogotá’s results were promising, with a lesbian club also known as Moza and some homosexual bars—mainly during the urban area’s brand new busy cultural hub, Chapinero.

On Friday evening, my personal girl and that I whizzed anywhere in a little yellow cab to Moza. We pulled up, strode out, and found that Moza was no longer. It sealed down a while ago, demonstrated the protection shield during the (hetero) club that stands in its aftermath. El Mozo (Moza’s gay bro club) was actually coming, so we nipped over here to track down so it had vanished as well.

We decided to recoup in a non-gay bar; the place had been alive with Latin rhythms and passionately Salsa dance (right) partners. Lone dudes, their unique breaths nice with aguardiente (Colombia’s national alcohol; just what tequila will be Mexico), came in mosquito-like droves, each on a mission to recover the unclaimed dames. They certainly were all extremely courteous and comprehended that a no intended no, however the heteronormative body weight within this club was actually a large number, specially when we’d psyched our selves up for every night of partying with a huge selection of Latin-lesbians.

We eventually kept and moved old-school. Flipping on our very own queer-dar, we mooched around the roads trying to find our very own colleagues. It did not take long before we found (everything we decided were) three other lezzas. We contacted and tentatively enquired about Moza and “bar homosexual,” while eying in the amount of their own fingernails, looking to perhaps get a hold of a secret lesbian bar or something associated with the type.

These people were really thinking about the convo and spoke around for some time concerning the lackluster lesbian world within town. Eventually, the dykiest-seeming of our brand new team (who would been one particular singing on the topic) remaining to attend a property celebration. We had been kept because of the various other two that hasn’t engaged in the gay chat very adamantly but happened to be eager to hold away with our company.

‘You want women?” she questioned eagerly.

We said we did, assuming we had been on a gay-level. Off we hopped in a taxi, which whisked us out for good few blocks before ending up at an inconspicuous entrance in the exact middle of no place. The 2 security protections (who knew our very own chaperones) considered us with complete bemusement. “Qué?” they said over repeatedly to our manual, as if she ended up being trying to take multiple wildebeest into the club.

We ascended the mirror-covered stair case presuming we had been heading doing a key queer mecca but quickly realised we’d been taken to a brothel. Without a doubt there is nothing completely wrong with brothels—I’m all for secure rooms for intercourse employees to accomplish their own job—however, the feeling in this spot was actually bad; a small number of suited males, egos throbbing while they surveyed the area of scantily clad ladies. Everybody gave us interested appearances. They held the hope that individuals happened to be sometimes gonna buy or promote sex whenever all we actually wanted would be to sip a cerveza and party to Sylvester. We left rather rapidly, stepped residence and mulled over the unbelievable breakdown of one’s huge homosexual evening out for dinner.

Night Two

Let us try once again. Theatron, Bogotá’s fourteen-room superclub, is ready to accept all, but it’s a gay pub (as accurate, the largest gay club inside the american Hemisphere) at heart. At 10 p.m., we had gotten during the 200-people queue, which wrapped all over place’s underground car park like an anaconda. A techno bass thumped from the threshold, and everyone jittered with excitement.

When in, we settled 55,000 pesos ($17) and got slightly synthetic mug for unlimited beverages all night long. This will be a typical thing in Colombian clubs, and possesses a truly good impact on the atmosphere in; cash and exchange are taken from the room, and no one concerns becoming plunged into an existential crisis when examining their particular bank balance next morning.

We roamed across the place bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and figured this is not really a place. It really is a village that gives refuge to a large number of pleasure-seeking folks weekly. Employees orchestrate the area meticulously; herding flocks of individuals, keeping stairways free of charge and churning out mixer-after-mixer.

You’ll need per week within the place to really will grips with it. Home songs played during the central open-air region. It is created like an urban area hub, with elevated DJ porches in the middle and beverage pubs, meals shops, and bars on their borders. There were no less than ten DJs every night. They blended numerous styles in various unique places. Reggaeton played in a chapel, enter a large amphitheater. Donna Summers played inside the psychedelic disco space, Celia Cruz is on from inside the salsa collection, and a DJ travelled in from Berlin to take over the techno chamber.

From my personal findings that evening, it would appear that different genres attract different amounts of heteronormativity. Salsa and reggaeton were everything about the heteros dry-humping according to the church’s stained cup windowpanes. The pop music room had been mainly younger, jubilant gay men flailing their particular arms because they drunkenly serenaded their pals. Techno appeared to attract the essential renewable lewks (piercings, died-hair, some fetish gear). It had been the quintessential queer room, though ruled by tanked homosexual men exactly who jumped supplements and de-clothed as the evening developed.

A lot of people had been Latin-American; there are multiple gringos from local hostels and only a small number of Ebony people. In general, there had been possibly three additional queer femme lovers boating the place. One duo had matching purple and blue-dyed bobs. Another happened to be a Mexican few I’d sat near to regarding the jet to Bogotá— we plainly move in small groups.

We gravitated to the queerness associated with techno roo but kept around midnight to go to (everything we thought had been) the ladies’s commodes: a pink doorway, a security guard out front side, therefore the term “Eve” written over the home.

We figured this was a really glam access to a lavatory while we mounted the glittery-pink stair case. When we hit the very top, we realized that was actually no toilet and we also had unintentionally found a secret lesbian club. In fact, Bogotá’s only lesbian bar—period.

The space was actually kitschy: fuchsia pleather couches, a hot green bar, pop-art paintings of dykons like Ellen, Gwen, Gaga, and Ginger covered the wall space. There is a pole dancing period (that has been absolutely becoming utilised), a big dance-floor, therefore the sole female DJ from inside the building.

There have been around thirty people in there. To start with we danced in a huge kumbaya asexual group, given that it had been cool and ambiguous who was queer and who was merely enjoying the femme fuel (in an effective way).

Since night advanced in addition to DJ began flowing more steamy Latin (Reggaeton and dancehall) rhythms within the crowd, couples started creating left, appropriate, and hub. The space eventually turned into what can simply be described as a clothed live-demo from the A-to-Z of standing lesbian sex positions. Couples brand-new and outdated happened to be positively choosing it. It was raw, hedonistic, Sapphic miracle.

Though we were efficiently encased in a huge gay club, the lack of home plan, less dangerous space policy, or active prioritization on site’s main entrance intended that this designated area showed a blessing for all of us lezzas. This key lesbian bar was actually truly the only devote the venue in which a woman could hug a girl without concern with opening an eye fixed to a sniveling inebriated man baring their teeth with glee. We embraced the independence of Eve, associated with secret lesbian club.

At the front end of the bar (we’d also come in along side it home) stood a big steel entrance, 2 meters by 2 meters (6.5 feet by 6.5 legs), with three doorway females saying “solamente por chicas” on perform. Many got it and shifted, but little batches of guys lurked outside of the entrance, ongoing for 5 or 10 minutes, looking at their particular tip-toes like sexy meerkats, attempting to sneak-a-peak inside the restricted territory.

Since clock struck 3 a.m., we pried ourselves from the Eve so we could discover more of the site. While doing the rounds in this breathtaking, sprawling village of hedonism, we found Lotus, a “unicamente hombres” location (apparently enabled to develop a safer room for gay dudes to explore off the combined crowd). It really is safe to express, there are no sets of women clambering to own a look inside indeed there.

We headed down seriously to the techno space and spent the residual number of hrs getting flushed with these people. We kept at 5 a.m., happy to own located this undoubtedly unique venue, as well as more content to have uncovered Bogotá’s secret lesbian club.

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