Bears in Space at Akbar
Posted on October 12th, 2009 by admin
This anecdote comes from a friend of a friend of a friend, so the accuracy is questionable. The friend, who is gay, is being visited by his vacationing brother, a hardass cop who isn’t homophobic per se, but is more than a little bit uncomfortable around gay guys that aren’t (a)his brother or (b) his brothr’s boyfriend. While the friend goes to work, his brother goes exploring. When they meet up for dinner, his brother reports back, “So I finally found a real bar in this city.”
“Yeah, what’s it called.”
“It’s a little neighborhood bar called The Jackhammer. It was great, the music was good and it was nothing but REAL MEN. I loved it.”
“Dear god, you didn’t go into the back room, did you?” My memory’s a little fuzzy at this point so I don’t remember if he says this out loud or just thinks it. The brother is either aghast when he finds out, or never does, and leaves Chicago with a nice memory of a blue collar bar that his brother would’ve never thought to take him to.
The point of the storey being:
I really need to start shooting more parties at bear bars.
The place packed early, cats were rowdy and in various states of undress, the drinks were strong, and I’ve never felt so goddamn pretty in my life. It was a great party.
It was also the first time I’ve seen a dude go-go dancing. He had like six costume changes (including an plastic bear masks, an astronaut’s helmet, and prison coveralls)!
I’d heard good things about Akbar from a few Chicagoans, who had showed up for an underwear party when they were in town last year. I liked it. It was a dive by this city’s standards, but hardly in reality. The whole place was upholstered to look like some 1930s view of Arabian opulence/decadence/danger. Part Indiana Jones, and part Aladdin; part view-from-the-palace and part view-from-the-market. Tacky paintings. Velvet rooftop awnings and chairs. It was pretty awesome, if bordering on the offensive (forgetting the dicey issue of homosexuality in the middle east, theming a bar after a culture that largely views alcohol as spiritually poisonous is, to say the least, odd), but that might be just me thinking too hard.
All our pictures from the night are below. Right-click to save them and they’re yours. More pictures can be found over at Rolling Blackouts.
