The Juice Box

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 bottles of water

by Leif Wauters

In the midst of Sydney Mardi Gras bedlam, bears have laid their paws on the week with a run of fun events that mark Bear Essentials 14. Wednesday night marked the traditionally crazed and sweaty Underbear party. There are lots of Underbear parties around the world. Bearracuda’s got ‘em, Lazy Bear has a version, but the Harbour City Bears put on the meanest – or friendliest as you want to see it – daddy of them all.

The Sydney clubbing landmark, Arq, used to be home to this furfest, but it’s now moved to another subterranean space down the road called the Oxford Art Factory. Mo and I arrived half past 10 PM to the smiling faces of friends we had yet to run into on our visit. As there’s no smoking in the club, it was funny to see guys milling about the sidewalk in loaner bathrobes so the could light up.

Down a long, spiral flight of stairs we arrived at the entrance to the “arrival room” where we were handed trash…erm…clothes bags for all but our skivvies. We squeezed our way through the rather unengaging front space to where the clothes check was. Well, it was more of a cross-roads between the front and main rooms and the bathrooms where the clothes check was. It was a pretty bad mash-up where it was hard to even grab some wall to change against. Add to that club security continuously clearing the doorways and stripping down was a bit of a challenge.

After dropping our duds, we pushed our way into the main room where local DJ stud-pup, Matt Effect, was already heating up the wall-to-wall kernels who were ready to pop! Watching Matt on stage dancing to his pumpin’ selections, it was hard to keep from moving as well. The only thing that kept Mo and I from kicking it up with our boogying brethren was all the socializing, as we were catching up with friends and familiar faces. Circling the handsome, choka dance-floor, we caught a couple of fun tracks with friends before escaping to the club’s crossroads for some air and an inevitable exit. Sadly we didn’t get to catch much of our friend Robbie’s Australian explosion as we had a full day on tap the next morning and needed to hang on to what wits we had.

All and all, it was successful installment of this not-to-be-missed dream-dance for bears, despite the inescapable challenges of the space. Note to selves – don’t plan to meet your in-laws for the first time the day after this frisky, belly ball. Hooray to the Harbour City Bears for churning out another sold-out year for this banner event.

Tags: Matt Effect, Rotten Robbie, Sydney