Said to be the hottest, newest, and wettest place to be in the Manila gay scene—a new ‘membership club’ kuning-kuno opened its doors a couple of weeks ago. Located not far from the corner of Buendia and Harrison, the nondescript exterior of the ‘QUEERIOSITY PALACE’ looks as though it would just have wanted to fade into the row of apartments along FB Harrison. Quite appropriate, if you ask me, for its intended clientele of ‘discreet gay and bisexual men’.
A skinny guy in white shirt, blue pants and a sailor cap sits near the entrance, looking nonplussed. He ushers you quickly into a small reception area, lined with a counter, where your two photo IDs are submitted and a membership form is filled out. Once they are convinced that you just wanna have a good time, are not a minor, or a senior citizen (older MGM, take note) they will take your P99 annual membership dues, and the charges for the night (depending on the time that you enter and on the kind of room you’d like to have, you pay between 160.00 and 400.00). You are given a number, you deposit your shoes and get a pair of slippers, and you are brought into the next room — the ’safety deposit ‘ area. Here, three more cutie sailor boys ask you to put in your mobile phone, valuables, etc in a plastic box; they record all this in a logbook–even the make and model of the phone, and then they will lock all your stuff up in a transparent (clear plastic) row of shelves — something like the post office boxes, except that they are all clear plastic–as you look on. You are given the same number for your shoes, your security box, and for the locker in the dressing room.
The dressing room is next–looks straight out of a movie set, with lightbulbs all around the corners of the huge mirrors, surrounded on all three sides–and there of course, are the cotton buds, the hair gel, but no mouthwash…
On to the locker room where another cute sailor boy takes you to the small lockers (not big enough to hang stuff) where you’re given a towel and a condom, as well as a key on an elastic band with your locker’s number on it. This happens to be the same number for your shoes, safety box, etc.
The restooms are fine, but no toilet paper–minus. Dipper and pail lang, and none of the extension hoses that you can spray your little butt with, unlike saunas in Thailand. The shower area is a long line of about a dozen showers, with ample shower power–no trickling here–but ther’s no hot water and it turns out to be a bit too cold for me. Anyway a nicle place to ogle–the shower floor is fascinating, made of stainless teel that’s non-slip. The gutter runs right through the middle of the stalls, and since there are no dividers you can glance left to right, up down, etc etc with ease. The showers are mounted back-to-back, so you actually have two rows of open showers. So far, so good.
There’s a bar that can sit around 8-10 people, and a small jacuzzi, can take at most 10-12, and a steam room on the ground floor–one section was closed off, which the owners say will be space for a gym. It will be a good location since those in the showers and those in the gym will be able to view each other, through glass that is just a bit translucent. The bar area, jacuzzi, etc has a white pebble floor that squishes as you walk. Good idea, you don’t need to mop up too often.
Excited ? There’s more upstairs…
The upper floor is spacious, with a few ‘queen rooms’ that have a full bath, and a twin bed. There are four such rooms; there is also a computer area, with three computers, which a number of people were surfing on…a decent sized room (about 16 sq m) with a flat screen TV showing adult gay films. No seats in this room, so you all line up standing by the walls watching those guys do fascinating things to each other…On the 2nd floor, more showers and toilets. The main rampa area has about 30 cubicles, each with a single sized bed, a fan, and roomy enough to accomodate five or six people, inf you fancy company. The rampa area is lit from the floor, with red fairy lights, located beneath transparent floor panels.
The second floor is done up in red and black–the red lights are on the floor and there are mirrors on the hallways, making it a little bit eerie at times, and highlighting valuable assets, sometimes in an unfavorable way. But generally visibility is OK, so you can smile at two meter’s length and be acknowledged or rebuffed. Temperature is kept a comfortable level.
So who was there that night ? There were about 30-35 people, age range from early 20s to early 50’s. Six Taiwanese, a couple of them muscle boys. Not bad at all. Most of course had their towels on–these are large towels, about 48" long. But a few roamed around in their briefs or underpants.
Overall, it strikes me as being a bit post-modern–concrete, steel, black and red lights, but also a bit home-y in parts. A good alternative to the Club Baths, and a more mature crowd compared to ‘F’. The minuses? No drinking water, no hot water, no sauna so far. Nothing like a groping room, and a gym to open soon. They don’t want people to wear caps, and have restrictions on people with long-hair (whether this is just the hair, or because somebody looks effeminate, I don’t know–but it all seems a bit arbitrary). These discreet kuno at mga pa-minta can be quite discriminatory with people who don’t fit their own sterotypical images of ‘men’ or who they feel are more ‘pa-girl’ than they are. It all looks a bit sexist, ageist and homophobic to me.
I have a feeling though that places like this have a market in Metro Manila, and I think it will be very popular in the next few months.
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