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Melvin Muranaka long wanted to open a bar in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ni-chome LGBTQ+ district, where he first felt free to be himself as a gay man, and with the ebbing of the coronavirus pandemic he thought his chance had come.

"I had a really strong image I was living in hiding, but when I came to Ni-chome the impression was that everyone was drinking and having fun just as they were," said the 29-year-old Muranaka, who is half Filipino.