City Club

I didn't get drunk. I didn't start making out with random Moldovan girls. I didn't get in a fight with a Moldovan guy. I didn't see a guy get killed by the Russian mafia.

My first time in a Chisinau club, I just danced and enjoyed myself.

Thursday was the swearing-in ceremony for Peace Corps Moldova 18, a new group of 35 teachers who will specialize in either English or health education. For them, it was the end of their pre-service training and the start of two years in their separate villages, towns and cities. To celebrate, the group went out to party the night before, along with many volunteers who were already serving.

After dinner at the Nistru Bistro restaurant, which we had reserved well in advance, and drinks at The Dublin, an Irish pub, we made our way to City Club, a dance club near the state university. I paid just under three dollars for admission, which I continue to consider a lot of money. After being patted down, I entered the club.

The circular dance floor had a diameter of about 40 feet and was encircled by tables on a raised platform, a stage and a bar. On the near wall, a second floor was lofted 15 feet above, providing space for more tables and, in one place clearly visible from the dance floor, metal cage bars that anyone could grab onto and dance against.

On the far wall, levitating eight feet above where the bar met the stage, were two cages. As opposed to the near wall, where any amateur could grind the bars, these cages were only for the pros. The pro female dancers were dressed in short dresses that flirted with the male club-goers' eyes, always implying that the men might catch a glimpse of more than just upper thigh if they watched long enough. The one male dancer, however, was the best reason to watch the cages. Bare-chested, clad in tight pants and with his long hair pulled back in a pony tail, this guy danced non-stop with a simple four-step, his arms at waist-level and his hands seemingly locked in a casual thumbs-up position. I don't know any female volunteer who was attracted to this dancing man. Perhaps male dancers exist in Moldovan clubs to convince the male customers that they won't be the only ones dancing.

The men seemed to be convinced, as they were dancing without shame on the floor. The area was flooded; guys in tight shirts and those ridiculous dress shoes that curl up at the toe like those of Santa's little helpers, girls with bare midriffs, tight jeans or short skirts and the bodies to make it work. American clubs tend to have large amounts of both good-lucking and lackluster girls. It seems that only the first group shows up at Chisinau clubs.

Unlike a village disco, City Club was well equipped with colored lights of every kind. The strobe lights were in full effect, making me think twice before tapping any of the new female volunteers on the shoulder, for fear that the disorienting effects would result in me either groping them or clipping them on the chin.

The music in any club is usually bad. The music in a European club is awful. The music in a Moldovan club is horrendous. Luckily, I have become desensitized to it by school dances and my host sister's musical choices on the home radio. So when one particularly poor yet popular Romanian song played, I sang along with the banal lyrics:

"Softly she whispers a slow melody.
A moment ago she was dancing with me.
All I want is a kiss or two.
Oh baby, don't go. I'm in love with you."

Thankfully, last year's Crazy Frog sickness seems to have run its course. We were spared "Axel F" this time.

At 1 a.m., all dancers cleared the floor; it was time for the contest. We volunteers gathered around a table populated by U.S. marines and their female Moldovan friends for the evening. Although the emcee conducted the contest in Russian, it was simple enough to understand the premise when he brought three couples to the stage and used the words "Kama Sutra". The crowd went wild. Each couple had to act out a unique sexual position of their own design. They went through five rounds, offering the entire club 15 sneak peaks into their bedroom exploits. The loudest applause getters, for those of you interested in Moldovan sexual practices, were the 69, the Reverse Cowboy and some amalgamation of Doggy Style and the starting position for a wheelbarrow race. I have no idea whether the applause meter measured the Moldovans' familiarity with these positions or their taboo nature. I'm sure there's a master's thesis in this subject just waiting to be written by a Fulbright scholar.

After the contest, the deejay switched to more of a hip-hop bent, and I was disturbed by how well I knew the words to DMX's "Up in Here". At 2 a.m., we left for our hotel rooms.

Overall, I enjoyed my first Chisinau club experience. It's not something that I'll be doing every weekend, but the next time the group of volunteers I'm with decides to go to a club, I might not be such a sourpuss. Because in actuality, this was a better clubbing experience than either of the two times I went in America. Maybe those Lonely Planet books that say that Chisinau has wild nightlife aren't totally lying.