Oxford Street - The World’s Gayborhood

You can’t miss it. Rainbow flags line the streets. Adoring gay couples wander lovingly down the road holding hands, gently kissing, and even going for it - especially after midnight. The clothing stores are primarily of the underwear variety. The clubs are unmistakably gay. Drag queens are arriving looking almost too fabulous, all on their way to that evening’s performance. 

This is Oxford Street - the 24/7 international gay Mecca that may be - as far as I’m concerned - the gayest of the gayest gayborhoods in the World. Yes there’s Soho in London and the Village in New York. You’ve got West Hollywood in LA and The Castro in San Francisco. 

The world is full of sometimes charming and sometimes much less charming neighborhoods where the gays just go for it. The difference here, however, is that the cliental, the apartment residents, the shopkeepers, the restaurant owners, and even the local bank logo are gay. In any other gayborhood there is this sense that you’re in a pocket of a much larger world but on Oxford street in Sydney, the feeling is that the entire world - in every direction - is gay. Here, being straight is odd. Here, holding hands with someone of the opposite sex indicates a “gal pal.” Here, kissing someone of the opposite sex is simply assumed to be a “drunken error.” 

Where else in the world does gay feel entirely normal? Rainbow flags fly year round and nearly a million homos converge on the city for Mardi Gras (one of the only gay pride parades in the world without a specifically gay name but with an entirely gay meaning). There are dozens - nearly 100 - gay bars, clubs, restaurants, and hotels crammed right next to each, making gay “normal.” 

 It’s a feeling you rarely get in the world at large when you’re gay. It’s a feeling that’s addictive, adoring, and appreciated. So what are you waiting for? Can you handle being “normal?”