TOKYO: When Toshitsune Tamashiro was young and closeted in 1980s Japan, Tokyo's Shinjuku Ni-chome gay district was a haven. Now he runs a bar there, and has fought to keep the district going during the coronavirus pandemic.

Ni-chome, believed to be the most dense concentration of gay bars globally, fulfils a vital role for Japan's LGBT community in a nation where some gay men still marry women, and even a few Ni-chome bar owners have not come out to their families.