Gay bars around disneyland

The neon sign that teased us from the freeway.

Like Queer Church on Sundays: Ozz Supper Club Gave Young LGBTQ a Place to Belong

The roomy parking gay adjacent to the convenient motel next door. Clandestine pre-parties in crowded cars, the line stretching along a dark wall lit up in rainbow colors. The butch bouncer with the power to grant or deny coveted drink wristbands. The Scooby Snacks and the Flaming Dr. The piano lounge, video games and pool tables.

The hottest music, the chillest vibe. The crowds, the friends new and old, the rush of it all. And of course, Raja. If you remember Ozz Supper Club — popularly known as Ozz — in Buena Park, California, you remember all of this and then some: maybe your first queer kiss or sultry same-sex dance, or a bad breakup on the smoking patio or the cute girl who bought you a beer and got your number, but never called.

Maybe your outfits: hat-to-the back, polo and cargo shorts sagging with a chunky Nokia cell phone and disposable camera, if you brought one. Or the shiny halter top and new heels that made you sparkle on the dance floor. Rene Boudewijn "Bodie" Kohler owned Ozz from until When the city sold the strip of freeway-adjacent land disneyland development, the building that housed Ozz and others around it were condemned.

Bodie signed the demolition papers, and in OctoberCalTrans bulldozed Ozz. Three years later, Bodie would serve around in federal prison for failing to report door fees to the club while it was in operation. Many of us who went to Ozz during its heyday were oblivious to any problems that maybe have precipitated the club's unceremonious ending.

Instead, we remembered a magical time of budding queerness and mutual bonding at the gay club near Knotts. Ozz marks a time before social media and smart phones, when we disneyland to make queer community the 'old fashioned way. And if you ever went to Ozz, chances are you went on a Sunday nights, when unders were welcomed and Raja ruled the world.

It was to Mariah Carey's Heartbreaker mix. She was a Latina with curly hair, clear lip gloss, wore a white button-down shirt and jeans," bars Luna Pwho attended Ozz with mixed group of gay from It's an Ozz memory that affirmed who she was at a around when she felt awkward and unseen, says Luna P, and it will be with her forever.

Luna P was 19, working at LAX, and living in a "crash pad" with other airline workers when she found Ozz. She first went with her roommates, including bar gay men and another bisexual woman. Some were over 21 and others, like Luna P, were not. So Sundays became their night. Despite the long drive from the LAX area to Buena Park after a hard day's work at the airport, Luna P and her friends looked forward to hitting up Ozz.

She described the "whole scene" just getting there — Destiny's Child or Britney Spears bumping through the car's speakers, the excitement upon seeing the freeway signs for Knott's Berry Farm "that meant we were almost there"pulling into the parking lot and watching the line grow as dance music thumps away inside.