72 marieclaire.com.auPHOTOGRAPHY BY DASNIYA SOMMER; MARIE ELLEN BROKENSHA COURTESY OF THE FESTIVAL OF REALLY GOOD SEX.advises workshop leader Mistress Mynx
during the Foot Pampering And Foot
Fetish workshop, explaining that the
ball of the foot can take more punish-
ment than the comparatively vulnerable
toe-piggies. I’m lying on my back with
my feet in the air while a stranger
smacks at my feet loudly with a rubber
spanking paddle. I hold two fingers in
the air, indicating the mid-range level of
pain I’m feeling. Three fingers generally
means “ow, please stop” – in this class,
anyway. I’m into it. I’d like to say it’s be-
cause I’m a sucker for a good, firm foot
massage, but perhaps I’m just not ready
to admit that the idea of a little pain gets
me going. This learning-my-boundaries
thing is a complex process.
FORGS, it seems, is hardly about
sex at all. Well, I mean it’s not really
about penetrative, peeny-punani, stick-
it-in-and-wriggle-it-around sex. It’s
mostly about play: role-play, massage,
hitting things, sucking things, tickling
things, tying things and, further along
the dial, cutting off the circulation to
things and mildly electrocuting things.
I chat to some fellow attendees – a sur-
prisingly high number of attractive
people in their 30s, and only a handful of
the middle-aged swinger stereotypes I
was expecting – and they’re here for dif-
ferent reasons. Some are curious about
broadening their horizons, some al-
ready have broad horizons and want to
really stretch them out, while others arefluent in multiple kinds of kink and
want to celebrate it in a big room with a
simpatico bunch of horny buggers.
“I’ve done a few courses in shibari,
can I practise on you?” asks the girl I’ve
been paired with for the Tying For
Erotic Intensity workshop, referring to
a traditional Japanese rope-bondage
art. She’s definitely had more experi-
ence than others in the room; while they
are gently forging comfortable single-
column ties around each other’s necks
and wrists, I’m suddenly on my knees,
trussed like a chicken with my hands
behind my back and my boobs strapped
into perkiness through my dress. I have
to admit I’m pretty into this as well.
Maybe it’s the secure feeling of restraint
and submission. Maybe it’s just because
my boobs look great in a rope bra.T
he fact that erotic play could
have little to no correlation
with actual sex is new to me,
and one of many ideas rein-
forced at FORGS. I listen to people who
are not one bit interested in traditional,
penetrative heterosexual sex, but could
happily and easily have an orgasm sim-
ply by spanking someone. The idea
seems bizarre until I remember being
transfixed watching James Spader giv-
ing Maggie Gyllenhaal’s bottom six of
the best in the 2002 film Secretary – the
first time I’d seen BDSM on the screen
in a thoughtful, not sniggery, way.I discover that, contrary to my ex-
pectations in an environment where
non-binary, inclusive descriptors are
key, people in the kink scene actually
love a label. When I mention I’m going
to the lecture about polyamory, my
rope-tying friend says, “so you’re poly-
amorous” as a statement, not a question.
Well, no. “I could go to a lecture about
space exploration without being an
astronaut,” I quip in response and she
looks crestfallen. My enthusiastic-but-
moderate sex life is boring the pants off
these people, sometimes literally.
“Oh, you’re a dom?” asks a self-
proclaimed gender-fluid tomboy sadist
when I tell them I’m generally bossy in
relationships. “No, I don’t think so” I
answer carefully, explaining that my
bossiness doesn’t really carry across to
doing nude things. “So you’re a submis-
sive, then?” pipes up a bloke who labels
himself as having sex-starvation issues
during the Fantasy Role-Play workshop.
I don’t think I’m that, either. I wouldn’t
be surprised if I’ve been labelled a
“vanilla normie” by these people, which
is a little disappointing for someone
considered relatively edgy by her
friends. I’m tempted to list the things
I’ve done that overlap the “kink” circle
on a sexy Venn diagram just to fit in, but
opt instead for a shy, naive dignity. My
sex labels, much like my politics, are
somewhere a bit left of the middle. No,
up a bit. Bit more. Thaaat’s the spot.Workshops at
FORGS included
rope-tying,
polyamory
exploration and a
‘conceptual orgy’.Happily, I
learn that my
suction level
can pop the
pointy end
off a carrot”SEX