Tokyo's gay scene is 300 bars and clubs packed to two blocks, where, perhaps surprisgly an otherwise regimented society, has been anythg go for s. So why, asks our Tokyo rrponnt David McNeill, is the wilst party town g to an end?
Contents:
- THE BOYS OF SHJU: IS TOKYO'S GAY DISTRICT DOOMED?
- THE 10 BEST SHJU GAY CLUBS & BARSSEE ALL THGS TO DOGAY CLUBS & BARS SHJU
- BT TOURIST-IENDLY GAY BARS SHJU NI-CHOME
- TOKYO GAY MASSAGE SPAS
- THE 10 BEST TOKYO GAY CLUBS & BARSSEE ALL THGS TO DOGAY CLUBS & BARS TOKYO
- GAY TOKYO · CY GUI
- EXPLORE GAY ROOMS & RENTALS TOKYO
- TOKYO GAY NIGHT TOURS WH TOKYO HANDSOME BOYS
THE BOYS OF SHJU: IS TOKYO'S GAY DISTRICT DOOMED?
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Only the lobby, cheerily adorned wh scen om a sex movie that pict a portly pany print beg diligently serviced by a young apprentice, do bee clear that this is one of Asia's biggt gay the ticket mache – 2, 600 yen (about £18) for a 13-hour stay – and pretty much anythg go, say guts who e om across Japan, and even abroad, to sample s treats. "This is a untry that happily liv wh ntradictns, " says Taq Otsa, thor of several books on Japan's gay scene. " Th, Tokyo, a cy wh a reputatn as one of the most uptight, buttoned-down pals, also boasts, s Shju district, one of the world's nst and most diverse ncentratn of gay bars and clubs: the Ni-chome (pronounced "nee-chomay") area.
"But, roughly half a century sce emerged as a refuge for homosexuals what was formerly a red-light district, the block is cle.
The lol mercial anisatn that promot Ni-chome timat that the number of gay bars the area has fallen by at least a third the past . The once exclively male gay clientele is filled out at the weekends wh the straight, the female and the simply cur.
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"Are gays vanishg om Shju Ni-chome!?, " wonred one of the untry's most popular magaz recently. He c the 2004 closure of the famo gay magaze Barazoku after 33 years as a key moment. "That was a symbolic event when the ter overtook gay culture here.
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"Ftgly, perhaps, as he shouts over the noise of the dis, Gloria Gaynor's great gay anthem "I Will Survive" poundg out of the partly mirrors the chang Japan's gay culture. The ia that gay people uld share a life together was a fairy-tale. "Though blighted by the typil agoni of personal inty and need for secrecy, gays and lbians Japan neverthels did not suffer the same outright reprsn as those other parts of the world.
Discrimatn Bra and the US, at least until the 1960s, was "horrendo", pots out Mark McLelland, a UK-born amic and thor of Homosexualy Morn Japan: Cultural Myths and Social Reali. "While Brish ps were still btg men public parks, Japan didn't even have an anti-sodomy law, nor what McLelland lls the "anti-homosexual rage" of many Christian cultur, the lethal fuel for homophobia and the "hyper-vlence" of gay-bashg cints.
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As Otsa puts : "Homosexualy was never nsired a s here, jt shameful. "But if Japan was more laid-back about s sexual preferenc, also lacked the polil and social isson that helped transform the liv of homosexuals elsewhere.
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Gayns was, and is still, largely seen as a personal liftyle choice, not somethg to be flnted or argued over on the streets and parliament. Otsa says he sometim looked wh envy at the battl for gay equaly other parts of the world. "It seemed very extreme and ighteng, but I admired how you uld shout your inty om the rooftops, and tell everyone that you were a gay relatnship.
GAY TOKYO · CY GUI
But progrs has been tortuoly slow, and many gays and lbians are still livg a lie, says David Wagner, a bs nsultant and 24-year veteran of the Ni-chome district. This is one of the biggt ci the world but the gay scene is pathetic. The Sydney gay para has maybe 500, 000 people marchg every year – Tokyo has maybe 3, 000, when happens.
EXPLORE GAY ROOMS & RENTALS TOKYO
" He still meets many gay men who are lyg to their fai about their sexualy. '"Homosexuals are still not legally regnised Japane civil law, civil unns are prohibed and there is, as yet, not a sgle openly gay law-maker or proment bs person, adms Kanako Otsuji.
A lbian activist, 2007 she ran as the untry's first openly gay ndidate a natnal electn, after publishg her bgraphy Comg Out.
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But this is still not a bad place to be homosexual.
"Ined, young gays hoppg om club to bar around Ni-chome fd bewilrg Otsuji's stggl to change society, or force to acknowledge their sexualy; one reason, perhaps, why she me near the bottom of the 2007 poll. But many accept that their liv have been transformed sce the last generatn of gay rporate samurai fled here om tormented liv. " His experience livg abroad has nvced him that Japan is iendlier to gays than elsewhere.
MiguelLos Angel, CA26 ntributnsEagle is a pretty ol bar the gay block at Shju, the staff is very iendly and sce s a place wh a lot of ternatnal visors they speak English!