Fahrenheit Café and Fitness Center
1204 E. Rodriguez Ave, New Manila
Quezon City
Pleasure is Key
By Mikee dela Cruz
PUBLISHED: MAY 2009

WARM BLOOD. The goal, as the name suggests, is to increase bodily temperatures.

In 2003, owners Wilbert and Ryan (no surnames), opened Fahrenheit Café and Fitness Center – the idea to do so coming months earlier, when the duo thought of putting up a bath house; collaborated by a friend (and the venue’s former  press relations manager) Genesis (still  no surnames), who suggested the addition of an entertainment lounge.  More than bearing the name of Wilbert’s favorite perfume, the place was named, yes, Fahrenheit because “it is a unit of measuring temperature, (and) it coincided (with) the idea of the club's concept.”

THE BEST GAY HUB? That claim is largely debatable. But that this place has its attractions goes without saying - and understandably so, too, since it has various offerings worth patronizing, not just visiting. Go check for yourself. PHOTOS FROM fahrenheitcafe.com.

That concept is, of course, to make bloods rise – and in the naughtiest ways of ways, i.e. through dancing, not just vertically but also horizontally, too.

And this is where the appeals of F (as the place is often dubbed) can be found.

As a gay venue – a “clean” one – it is one of Quezon City’s oldest.  Yes, yes, 2003 was but six years ago; but in a country where GLBTQIA (particularly gay) establishments (or any efforts, for that matter) open and close in a matter of months, six years is almost a lifetime.  That this place manages to stay alive shows the need (and providing thereof) of a venue for the community to be who/what they want to be sans worries of what those not like us may say.

It helps, siyempre, that the venue has somewhat lots of things to offer – e.g. the place has affordable so-so food (it’s a café, hey); a so-so gym (it’s a fitness center, too, hey); though more widely recognized are the dance parties at the F club, competitive with those hosted in the City of Manila or Makati City by other gay venues; and the beauty pageants to celebrate transgender beauty, the male form, or drag performers.  Somehow, there’d be something there that will make someone's visit well worth it.

And then there’s the bath house section of F – a venue that, in itself, needs to be looked at in more detail in a segregated part of the whole (even if it’s but a part of that).

To wit:

Compared to, say, E, there are more cuter guys (err, MSMs) in F.  Yes, this is subjective, so drop by the venues to see for yourself.

The venue is relatively bigger, too, than other venues of this sort in the Philippines – meaning, at F, there are more rooms, longer labyrinth, bigger steam room, more lockers, more showers, et cetera.  The bigger the venue means more people to accommodate meaning more men to have – at least possibly, which means you’d have what you came to this place for one way or another.

Not all pluses here, though.

There are days when the steam room doesn’t work.  On those times, forget the pores cleaning.

The place can get dirty, too.  Just outside the steam rooms or the showers, the floor can get really, really wet with liquid that you don’t know from where originated.  Oh, and there are people who claim to have gotten STIs from the Jacuzzi…

Ditto with those rubber slippers – the venue provides slippers and towels to use while there, and while the towels are freshly washed, those slippers…

Then there’s that continuing annoying lack of aiding in the promotion of safer sexual practices among MSMs – i.e. condoms are not provided (what venues like this should realize as a MUST to help curb the HIV/AIDS epidemic among MSMs in the Philippines).  It’s called responsibility, what venues like F need to develop.

During F’s first months (years even), the company tagline was tagline was The Degree of your Lifestyle; Your Choice, Your Pleasure!, connoting that having “any choice of pleasure is a degree of every man's lifestyle, (and in) that choice is Fahrenheit,” states F in its Web site – somewhat confusing, honestly, though to be deduced is the push of the venue to provide pleasure, carnal or… well, carnal.  And the place continues to succeed in doing this (especially since there are no other place like it in Quezon City), so that a new slogan was launched, The Country's Best Gay Hub!, a big claim backed by, thus far, 8,362 members.

And so, while having “events that have marked the edge of time, as time passes by, these will be perpetuated, until Fahrenheit became everyone's legacy,” the company further states in its Web site – again, somewhat confusing, though the push for the place to become a big part of many MSMs life is no more an intention, as it already is a reality.

Try on for size.

Visit Fahrenheit Café and Fitness Center at 1204 E. Rodriguez Ave, New Manila, Quezon City.  For more information, call (+632) 7256699 or 9189008002; or visit fahrenheitcafe.com.