No Boys Allowed in the Mysterious Girl Nerd Cafe of Osaka
Nathaniel Wood

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No Boys Allowed in the Mysterious Girl Nerd Cafe of Osaka

The Ataraxia Cafe in Osaka, Japan is a modest place where female anime and cosplay fans can indulge in their nerdiest hobbies free from the grubby presence of boys.

Ataraxia cafe is designed specifically for female manga, anime and cosplay fans to indulge in their hobby free from grubby presence of boys. Anime plays on large flat screen TVs while girls sit and play video games on their phones or a Nintendo DS. Ice coffee is on offer, manga comics are neatly packed into streamlined walls, but the real action is down the hall in a small work room filled with mannequin heads and bare plastic torsos. This is the cosplay room, where girls trim wigs or tailor their costumes on sewing machines. There's no entrance fee, no dues, only one rule: no boys allowed. The women were nice enough to let me into the cafe and to shoot some pictures. In order for everyone to feel comfortable I wasn't allowed to photograph faces. Not that the faces were easy to see, every one was engrossed with what was in front of them. It was a easy and serene place, populated with content hobbyists doing what they love.

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