As I walked in, I felt a surge of 'deja vu'. Nothing about the inside gave any feeling of being in another world.
It was a two story home, furnished very sparsely.
Nothing about it to indicate that, "Here lives the President of the Prostitutes' Association."
I felt a little sheepish about my initial reaction.
The house reminded me of the time I was applying for an internship with a criminal law firm
and was surprised to find a "normal" lawyer's office...
....no nooses hanging from the ceiling!
We sat down on the sofa and I asked the first "brilliant" question that popped into my head.
"So tell me what you do.”
She didn't hold back.
“I pick up men as they drive slowly by, scouting for flesh.
A car stops.
I jump in.
He drives to a vacant parking lot behind a building.
He does his job. I'm lucky to get paid, let alone get back intact.
"This is a job filled with danger.
There’ s no protection for prostitutes.
The customer can rape us, mutilate us, rob us, murder us,
and we are completely at their mercy.
"That's why my partner always waits behind me,
so that right after I've popped into the car,
she takes down the license number and the make of the car.”
As she’s talking, Vicky's partner, a short, young woman, walks towards the door.
She’s putting on her cap about to take her bicycle out to buy some milk.
Suddenly , without warning, in the middle of a sentence, Vicky runs to say a loving goodbye to her partner.
And all of a sudden, in my mind's eye,
Vicky is transformed into a delightful, 3-year old little girl,
wearing a pink tutu, black patent leather shoes,
and reaching up to kiss her father good-night.....
Vicky returned to the sofa and continued telling me about her work.
“When it's available, we work on our own premises.”
“Who are your customers?”
"Men who are in between affairs.
Men who don't want sex but who just want to talk."
For a moment a fleeting smile hit Vicky’s lips.
“When it's a woman client, we give her a special rate."
There is also a telephone service Vicki provides .
"Men who call and ‘order’ you to be at their hotel room at a certain time.
They like the feeling of control that giving the order gives them."
Vicky, now more relaxed, began to share her feelings.
“I have always felt incensed that we as prostitutes were not protected."
At a certain point, Vicky was driven to start the Prostitutes Association.
One of her first projects as the President of the Association
was to visit bordellos in different countries to experience
the different conditions in which the prostitute worked.
"The contrast with working in a bordello turned being self-employed
as a prostitute into a dream job!"
The contrast turned the bordello into a hell's hole.
"The girls in the bordello had no say as to who their clients would be
even when the client had a history of being abusive!"
On the surface, the money looked good. But the reality was different.
50% of what they earned was skimmed off the top by the house,
25% was skimmed off the top for taxes.
"And out of the pitiful amount that remained, the bordello prostitutes
had to pay the house's price for a pack of cigarettes:
$12 when the store price was $1!”
And now I dared to ask the question:
part 3/3 "
