A Sober Turkish Artist's Sex Guide to Berlin

Around this time last year, I was in Berlin for the International Forum program of Theatertreffen, Germany's most prestigious theatre festival.

To be selected for this program, which brings together theatre professionals from around the world, you need to produce work that addresses current social issues.

Theatertreffen is known for bringing together the ten most exceptional German-language theatre productions each year.

In the 2023 selection, my forum group diagnosed major issues of representation: white feminism in the feminist play, white gayness in the gay play, and a pervasive whiteness in the other works.

As an artist politically validated by Theatertreffen, it’s my duty not to limit myself to theoretical critique but to live the realities I want to see staged.

That’s why, despite the packed festival schedule, I made it a point to visit as many gay venues in Berlin as possible. I did what any performance artist working with their body would do without blinking to address the representation problem on the German stage.

What makes this guide unusual is that the artist sharing these experiences spent 21 days in Berlin without using any drugs and drank only a single 33cl beer.

I dare say: among the men I had sober sex with, you won’t find a single white European…

BOSE BUBEN – Serbian

I entered Bose Buben with a warm welcome from a bartender who looked like he’d been there since the '90s. It was the most aesthetically stunning sex club I’ve ever seen. Wandering through its floors and themed rooms felt like touring the set of a very well art-directed porn film.

First, I observed the daddies having sex in a room decorated like a bourgeois salon on the ground floor. Their rhythm was calm. With the accessibility of sex, the comfort of the couches, and the seasoned air of those over forty, they focused on the intoxication of pleasure rather than wild lust.

While exploring the second floor, I picked my target. I never spoke to the man, whom I later learned was Serbian. What happened between us was the kind I wouldn’t want to cheapen by explaining.

After we parted, I respectfully gave him space. But soon he started hooking up with someone else. Resisting my Middle Eastern urge to possess and suppressing my inner melodrama about being so quickly forgotten, I strolled around like a calm European who had learned to tame primal urges with civilization.

Then I saw the Serbian flirting with a younger guy. Since talking is allowed in sex clubs, I could no longer suppress my sense of ownership. The moment I caught him alone, I pulled him aside and declared my love.

I chose to listen to his eyes rather than his words resisting romance, and invited him to my hotel after a taxi ride where our knees touched.

I’m proud I had examined the Bose Buben schedule before arriving in Berlin, picked my night, and didn’t let one of the best nights of my life get lost in Berlin’s culture of personal distance.

TOM’S BAR – Romanian

This bar had a special charm both in its weekday calm and weekend crowd.

I liked how men whose clothes and thoughts seemed hygienic at the bar descended to the dark room downstairs and transitioned into a universal indecency, shedding their class-based reserve.

Here, I flirted with a blonde, muscular, sexy Bel Ami-type guy from Romania. At first, I thought I was reliving my 20s Casanova days. Once I realized how high he was, I found it hard to take credit for the success.

BOILER SAUNA – Egyptian and Ukrainian

With its blue-lit cabin labyrinths, shadowy bodies in the steam room, and glass-walled voyeuristic jacuzzis, Boiler Sauna offers a visually cinematic sexual experience that doesn’t neglect a single sense—thanks to just the right techno at just the right volume.

The first time I went, I made love to a Ukrainian guy with mutual gentle massages. While we cuddled, he told me about the history books he was reading.

On my second visit, I unknowingly approached an Egyptian guy I had chatted with on Grindr in Istanbul. While we were having sex, saying "I like you" to each other felt like the English equivalent of saying “aşkım” (my love) in Turkish during sex.

FICKEN 3000 – Iranian

Maybe it’s because I went without a plan or expectation, but Ficken 3000—despite the surrounding cigarette smoke—made me feel most like I was in a movie while in Berlin.

I approached a charismatic man scanning the room with familiar eyes. When I learned he was a Francophone Iranian playwright, I was surprised at my libido for once taking me to someone like myself.

During a walk along Landwehrkanal, I remembered what I love about intergenerational gay friendship, as we chatted about love and loneliness.

NEW ACTION – Israeli

Even though I was deeply curious about leather bars and had a visual admiration for the leather fetish, I wasn’t in a position to invest in a costume for a one-time bar visit.

When I showed up in jeans and a shirt, they let me in considering I’d lower the average age inside.

Wandering among fully leather-clad men without matching the dress code felt like a test of social courage.

I enjoyed watching the voyeurism in the bathrooms, the raw quickies in the well-lit labyrinths, and the soft kisses not held back by macho outfits.

I connected with an Israeli here. Later, when I went next door to Bull, I just watched.

LAB.ORATORY – Polish

A prestigious educational institution located next to Berghain. It hosts rituals of gay men transitioning into rough gay masculinity.

Sex in Lab.oratory is like communication via Instagram stories.

You can’t predict when or from whom it will come, how long it will last, or when it will end. When it begins, it excites you; when it ends, it leaves behind a void that’s hard to live with and drives you to seek solace in the next one.

Just as green-ringed stories on Instagram make you feel special, the privacy of what happens when you lock the cabin door with a Polish man can feel as intimate as a WhatsApp message.