The Main Course

Tags

brothels, clients, consent, discrimination, laws, mandatory testing, Melbourne, personal stories, safe sex, sex industry, stigma, the boss, Victoria

After the raid at Karma Therapy I felt lucky. I had gotten away without being arrested or even charged, but it was the second one I had been through. The first one had left me with a criminal conviction that stays on my permanent police record and I didn’t want to know what would happen if I was caught in a third raid. So I began to think about other options.

I had heard that there were legal brothels in other states and I had met sex workers who had gone to Melbourne and made decent money. I was single and without responsibilities at the time and so after chatting with my friend we decided to travel to Melbourne for a working holiday. This was before everyone had the internet, and the only way to get information was to get our hands on a Victorian Yellow Pages and “let our fingers do the walking”.

Choosing a brothel in Melbourne to work at was as simple as calling up the first couple of ads that appealed to us for whatever reason and making some enquiries. We settled on the the place that seemed the most welcoming and didnt make us jump through too many hoops. That was “The Main Course”.

I just looked it up online, it still exists, but looks a lot classier than it was back then. Maybe I should have changed the name but I chose not to because, well, you can’t make up more a amusing name than “The Main Course”, but my recount about my time(s) there is from 15 years ago, so please, don’t take this post as some kind of “review” or description of the current establishment in any way..

And wow. It was an eye opener for me. It was the first time since I began in the sex industry, that I was working in a place that looked like what I had always pictured a brothel to look like. It was an old terrace house, with about 4 levels and 10 work rooms. All the work rooms had built in showers showers and buzzers and other brothelly conveniences. We had a staff dressing room and our own lounge and bathroom and there were cupboards and cupboards and cupboards and cupboards of clean fluffy towels everywhere. On a busy Saturday night I would be on shift with up to 20 other workers. It was a change compared to what I was used to, which was very small discreet settings with only two of us on shift. I have this vivid memory of the main course where I was leaning into the long mirror, the kind of mirror with stage lights all around, I was fixing my makeup along with a bunch of other women in various states of undress and lingerie, there were racks and racks of costumes and fetish wear behind me, and I could see into the lounge where there were even more women reading, knitting, passed out, eating, gossiping, and I just wished I had a camera. Well I wished I had a camera and was allowed to use it. I knew this image belonged in my future book. It’s ingrained in my memory as one of those… picture memories that signify a whole section of your life. It was so….. surreal.

I was young, shy, baby-faced, fairly innocent and good girl looking and here I was amongst these seasoned, sexy, confident, experienced women. It took me a while to settle in.

On our first night management  showed us around, told us the prices and introduced us to the other workers. We had to show our ID, which we weren’t used to (being from illegal Adelaide) and that made us a little nervous, but we quickly got over it.  As soon as the manager left us alone, the other workers grabbed us and starting whispering to us: “They say its $120 for half an hour but its $150 for half an hour, we all charge $30 more than management say, and we keep the extra money, we all do it, the clients expect it, and if you don’t do it, your undercutting us and then there will be issues”

(haha I notice according to the website that price hasn’t gone up in 15 years)

“but what if the client says he was quoted a lower price on the phone, wont we get in trouble?”

“No, if they demand the cheaper price, then just accept it, but give them a shit service, we all do it, you wont get into trouble”

“So I get my half of $120 plus the extra $30, sounds fine to me!”

And that was our orientation to our new workplace. But our initiation was yet to come. In Victoria, brothels are legal and licensed and one of the laws is that sex workers have to get tested for sexually transmitted infections regularly. I think it was fortnightly back then. As we had just arrived from Adelaide and come straight into work without our ‘pink slip’ (the medical certificate), our boss had been so kind as to book in a nurse to come to the brothel to do our tests. Now even back then, I could see the ridiculousness of this. For a start, it would be weeks before I got the results,  by which time I would be back in Adelaide, so what was the point? Secondly, things like HIV take 3 months to show up in your blood, so really it  was only going to tell them an accurate result for 3 months ago, if I had contracted something yesterday, it wouldn’t show up until 3 months time. And also, I use condoms all the time, so whats the issue?  And I got tested regularly by myself back home, I knew i didn’t need to get tested, I hadn’t broken any condoms, I hadn’t taken any risks. But, we went along with it because we wanted to work.

The nurse took me into one of the workrooms, got the bright light out, had me strip off below the waist (no discreet little privacy sheets or towels for a whore) and I layed on one of the brothel beds. Once in position she began poking and prodding me and shoving things into me.  It was awful, I mean, pap smears are kind of invasive at the best of times, but in this context? almost under duress? it was very undignified. But the worst bit was when she explained she was about to do an anal swab! I protested! Why did she need to do an anal swab? I don’t do anal sex. I don’t allow my clients or anyone in my personal life to go near my bum. But she insisted. I cried. The sensation of the swab being pushed into places where I didn’t want it. It was…….. confronting, and pointless, and when I think about it all these years later, it makes me angry. A whore’s holes are NOT public property!

I felt stupid for getting upset about this invasion of my body, but it didn’t detract from my desire to make money. I was lucky to have my friend with me who made me feel justified in my emotional reaction. But in the end I just wanted to get on with my job.  I mean, I HAD to make money now, I’d just had a nurse unconsensually shove objects into my anus so that i could have permission to make money. And so a money-making we did go.

Intro’s at The Main Course were a whole new thing again. I was used to us workers meeting the clients one at a time, having them tell the receptionist which worker they chose and then taking them to the room and beginning the service. And anyone who did the math earlier might have realised 10 work rooms and 20 workers on shift could occasionally present problems.

For a start, it was competitive. Very. And I’ve never been good at competitions. How could a quiet, innocent looking me  in my cute little office attire and full brief undies compete with these sexy g-string clad vixens with a skill for dirty talk? And then when a client did choose me, how do I hang on to them since usually we would have to wait for a room to become available, and in the  meantime every other worker in the place would walk past with her bedroom eyes and wandering hands and before you know it, my client would abandon me for them.

I spent the first night working hard and not making a lot of money. I watched the other workers, i tried to be like them, I was pashing clients before I even got a room just trying to keep them. I couldn’t compete. I gave up. But by the end of the first night I had figured it out. I didn’t need to compete. I had my own thing. All that stuff I was trying to play down, I needed to play it up. “I’m shy, innocent and the good girl next door, no I can’t dirty talk, but pick me, im super sweet.” And it worked. I had found my niche, and I liked it. Much easier than trying too hard to be something so far from what felt comfortable.

The main course had a good deal going for the workers that on the 10th job, you got to keep all the money. I hit that target plenty in my first week there. $1000 a night was a good night at the main course. Who can argue with that?

My favourite client

Tags

brothels, clients, laws, personal stories, safe sex, sex industry, Sex Work, south australia, the boss

Next stop, Karma Therapy. It was the name of the brothel I started working at after I had an argument with the extremely unpredictable boss at the brothel I loved. Any long time Adelaide brothel creeper client type will remember it.

I had to show my boobs to the receptionist at the interview. Sex industry interviews in South Australia are a funny thing. As an average looking 19ish year old, I knew they wanted to give me a job more than I needed the job. But the interview would involve both of us dancing around the details, talking in riddles, me not wanting to make them think I’m a cop, them hoping I’m not a cop. Very similar to a sex worker trying to negotiate a service with a new client, being careful not to say anything that could get us in trouble. By asking me to lift my top and flash my boobs and checking to make sure I wasnt a cop, this receptionist cut straight to the chase. I felt uncomfortable but I obliged, and I was actually glad I did. It made the interview so much easier, I was able to be clear about what I wanted from a job (day shifts, no cops, decent money per shift) and they were able to be clear about what they offer (pay, service, they supply condoms lube etc). The price they charged the client was less, and therefore so was my pay per job, but the place was busy, and so it gave it a go.

It was another brothel run by an ex sex worker in a house in suburbia, this time a larger house, with about three workers on shift. At Karma Therapy I learnt about ‘intros’. Intros were when the client got to meet all the workers and then choose who he wanted to see. I wasnt used to this. The last brothel I worked at, we just took it in turns. The clients would sit in the waiting room and we would go in one at a time to say hi,  introduce ourself and briefly discuss our service. As I mentioned, this brothel wasn’t shy, so instead of having to be coy around the subject of sex, using code words like “full service”, this brothel had a different method of avoiding the police detection. The same receptionist that had me show her my tits, would also make the clients undress. By the time us workers met the clients they would be in a towelling robe having flashed their bits to our gatekeeper. This made our job a lot easier as we could talk openly about our do’s, our don’ts, our prices and our service.

The management were obviously as concerned as I was about the police because they were also paranoid about condoms or lube being used against us as evidence, which is still a common police practice in our great state. In the last brothel I worked at we had plenty of every safe sex products, everything you could possibly need in the bedside table drawers. Not this one. Instead just before every job, I would be given a tissue with a blob of lube on it and a condom. Already opened! Just one! Now any sex worker knows, it is not uncommon to need more than one condom in a booking, or to perhaps need access to different size condoms, or to want plenty of lube to be available. And im no germ-aphobe, but I like my condoms to come STILL IN THE SEALED PACKET!. Yet another shitty side effect of our crap laws.

But they were protecting me from the police, so I felt safe. It seemed like a full proof plan, but it must have missed something, because still,  one day there was a raid. No matter how many times I meet the cops, they never fail to intimidate and scare me. This was no different. I was in the room with a client at the time, an old italian guy. It was a quick service. We were nearly at the end when I hear the doorbell ring repeatedly. No sooner than I register that it’s the receptionist warning us, the banging on my door starts. I hear the police yelling “open the door before we bang it down!”. They are thumping on the door so hard, yelling loudly, and I hear footsteps everywhere outside. My client and I throw our clothes on while I quietly repeat over and over and over again “you just had a massage, you just had a massage, you just had a massage, you just had a massage” , I hoped he could hear me over the panic and the door being bashed down. Even thinking about it now makes my heart race.

I was so scared rushing around but I managed to opened the door just before the flimsy lock broke. As soon as I did, I was grabbed by one of the 3 male cops and shoved roughly out of the room, a female cop lead me to the lounge where she took my details and checked my ID and then we waited silently. When i was being lead down the hall I saw my good friend being questioned in one of the other rooms, she was crying. My client was being questioned in my room and there were two other cops searching the place. about 8 or 10 cops in total sent to bust three of us female workers that were on premises. This is your tax money, isn’t it crazy?

My mind raced, I had been through this before, I knew what came next. I sat there silently and awaited my fate. The cops were questioning, intimidating, threatening my client with anything they think might work, trying to get him to make a statement against me. Trying to get him to give me up. Any minute they would lead him out, he would look all scared and guilty and when asked by the police to identify me, he will point his finger at me. I was numb, terrified, waiting.

So you can imagine my relief, when after another eternity, I see my client waving at me, smiling widely as he walks out the door, “Ciao Bella, see you next time”. I was shocked, I looked at the cops who looked back at me and said “you can go”.

I didn’t question them, I left, quickly, before they changed their mind. I made sure I grabbed all my stuff because I had no plans to come back. This was too scary. I didn’t want to go through that again. I walked and walked and walked until I saw a taxi and hailed it. I was grinning as widely as my client was. I loved this guy! He didn’t give me up! I don’t know what he said, I don’t even know what he did with the condom he was wearing, but he didn’t let them intimidate him. He didn’t even look shaken as he called out that he’d see me next time. I don’t remember his name, I wouldn’t remember him if I saw him on the street tomorrow, but even after all these years this guy is still, by far, my most favourite client ever!!

Sex as a service

Tags

clients, consent, disability, discrimination, feminism, friends and family, personal stories, rants, Relationships, sex industry, Sex Work, sexuality, south australia, stigma, virgin

I have been participating around the blogosphere in ‘debates’ where I find myself constantly having to justify my job as a valuable service and needing to fight against the suggestion that I am an exploited victim (with the perpetrator being the employers or clients).  In a way I hope that anyone following my blog for any period of time will be able to come to their own (possibly more informed) conclusions.

Recently I wrote about a client of mine who had autism, and it led to some discussion about providing sexual services  to clients who have disabilities, which led to again more questions about the ethics of my work. As I already vented about, it was suggested that people with disabilities might be exploited victims (with the perpetrator being families and sex workers). Again with the notions of victims and exploitation.  More inaccurate judgements and discriminatory assumptions.

Let me challenge a few of those assumptions for you.

Many many sex workers, including me, have got experience or training as carers, nurses and support workers in the disability and aged sector. I worked as a carer in my early 20’s both in disability and aged care, in one of my guilt induced, partner enforced ‘retirement’ from the sex industry. Frankly, dealing with naked body’s and natural bodily functions and things that other people find icky, and doing it all while trying to provide a little human care…. it’s not that far of a stretch from sex work. Except – one has way better pay and conditions (but I’ll do a post about that another time)

Anyway, many of us have a caring and compassionate streak, and enjoy those occasions when our work allows us to share with someone something special. For example, a young man with Autism wants to lose his virginity at  age 30, or an old widowed man hasn’t been touched in a gentle caring way for years and wants a sensual massage. Or like my first overnight booking, with a man who was lacking in social skills and confidence and just wanted to wake up next to a woman for the first time in his life. I know a sex worker in her 60’s who only sees clients above 50, and specialises in nursing home visits.

Some of us enjoy this part of our work so much that we specialise in that area of sex work, like the amazing Rachel http://www.scarletroad.com.au/trailer/ some of us attend training like the training done by touching base, and some of us provide discounts. We are service professionals, we know our job, we train, we network, we bring experience.

Not all of our clients are men. Especially amongst our clients who have disabilities. Women with disabilities often express sexual desires and strategies to meet those desires. It is true however,  that care agencies and institutions often overlook women as sexual beings so there are more barriers to women accessing a sex worker than for men. But there are still plenty of female clients. A male sex worker I know once had a woman contact him after seeing him on a list of disability trained sex workers. She didn’t have a disability, but she did feel vulnerable. She had been abused in her youth and had stayed celibate until her 40’s. She was calling my friend, not because she couldn’t get sex, but because she wanted safe, controlled, fully negotiated, consensual sex with firm boundaries and it needed to be with someone who was understanding, caring, compassionate, gentle AND sensual. She got that and she ended up seeing him a couple of times that year, each time becoming more confident.

And sex workers don’t always do sex. When working in my straight disability support job I heard a story about a sex worker being hired to teach a young man how to masturbate. He had been behaving inappropriately in a group home setting, pulling out his penis in public, and rubbing it literally red raw at night. After consultation with parents and doctors, a sex worker was hired to spend an hour in his bedroom with some lube and a picture magazine, showing him carefully and talking to him openly about where and when. It worked a miracle. Who else would or could do that job?

And our clients arent always lonely. Whilst doing my annual disability friendly sex work training, I heard another beautiful story about a married man and woman. Both with profound physical disabilities. They wanted to have sex. They needed someone to help them, to put them into position, and physically assist them.  Who else will do that?

Now I wont deny that most of my clients are able-bodied men on their lunch breaks, looking for uninspired back rubs, blow jobs and a simple release. But that is not all our job is about. Even if you can’t see the service in sex, you can’t deny the value many sex workers provide for many clients that do not fit into your preconceived ideas.

Sex work is real work. Stick around, hopefully I’l convince you by the end.. (of my life)

The right words…

Tags

Love, personal stories, Relationships, sex industry, Sex Work, stigma

It was around the time that I had settled into my new job at the in-house brothel, that I started to really feel the pinch of whore phobia in my personal life. It was the beginning of a run of bad experiences that eventually pushed me into the closet in a very real way. I stopped being the “happy hooker” high on my own sense of power, always open and honest with everyone as if I had not a care in the world, and instead I began sinking into confusion, guilt, lies. It was the discrimination I faced outside of work that eventually led me to the split personality of the double life I now lead. I learnt to lie to protect myself from the people who didnt pay me. 

I am talking about *grimace* relationships. Romantic emotional relationships. I fell into bed and not long after, in “love” with a friend. Someone who already knew about my work so we didn’t need to have the talk . And I didn’t need to worry about whether they’d still like me, or explain all the nitty-gritty details that new people often want. We were friends, they already knew me. It never occurred to me that my work would be an issue. It was just a job, right?

Oh how naive I was.

My new partner wasnt  the controlling type, or at least, they didn’t want to be. But they were the jealous type. And with me being totally unaware that someone who loved me would possibly have problems with my work, it took a while before the unspoken started seeping through the cracks.

2 years I stayed with this person. They lived with me. Lived off of me. And their hatred of my job grew, fueling cruel and bitter words. 2 years I lived with guilt and shame and confusion and uncertainty.

I knew my work was just work. I knew we both depended on the money. I knew I liked the job better than other jobs I had. I knew without it we would struggle. I knew I had nothing to be ashamed off. But I knew this person hated it. Hated me doing it. Hated me. Hated it. Hate hate hate. It wasn’t a nice place to be. I worked more trying to get away, my partner spent more time hating me trying to keep me.

It wasn’t healthy. But then I guess lots of relationships aren’t.

I wrote this poem at the time. Its kinda childish, but I was only 19 or 20 at the time. I found it in my diary.

The Right Words:

You watch me get ready, you’re not ok.
I search for the right words to take your pain away
unwanted guilt clouds my mind
making truth and clarity hard to find

I try to ignore it but I feel your pain
Some days it feels like we are both insane
Thoughts and feelings racing around
Do I argue and fight? or be gentle and kind?
Should I make you promises I don’t want to keep?
And then I’ll slip down that slope and be in too deep.

The air is tense as you watch me dress
I really hate dealing with this stress
I don’t want to leave – but i got the call
The arguing starts as i walk down the hall.

“you better not cum, or let him kiss”
FOR FUCK SAKE how many times must we go through this!!!

“There are other ways to make money……. don’t you have any self-respect honey?”

When resentment enters, I get mean
“Do I have to justify it all again??” I scream

I’m proud, I manage, and I stay strong.
And I know im not doing anything wrong.
I hate arguing like this every day

I just wish I knew the right words to say.

Sidetrack – Abortion.

Tags

abortion, birth control, contraception, feminism, parenting, pro choice, rants, single mothers

As a menstruating woman, who has had sex with sperm producing men for many reasons other than procreation,  I would like to say a few things about birth control and access to abortions.

Disclaimer: This post is nothing but another indulgent rant bought to you by “letters i need to write and arguments I need to have and things I need to say, after reading other people’s blogs”. The public venting I need to have!

Ok: if you want to decrease the rate of abortions there are a few things you need to consider before you go round trying to put some more laws onto women’s bodies.   Women not only need  access to good quality sex education and reproductive information and options, we don’t only need access to cheap birth control. What we actually need is access to BETTER BIRTH CONTROL! Currently the choices available to human beings who want to prevent pregnancy are abysmal, and nearly all of them place all of the responsibility on the woman.

 There is the condom: responsibility for initiating condom use often falls to the woman and paradoxically is used as a tool of humiliation against her (eg young women in possession of condoms are seen as having loose morals) or in the case of sex work, used against us as evidence of a crime. And even condoms are of limited effectiveness if they are not accompanied with good education about how to use and negotiate them (for the record they are my only means of birth control and I have found them to be 100% effective).

There are hormonal options such as “the pill” and the various injections they have these days. These are problematic for many of us. I refuse to use these methods due to their effects on my body and mental health. They made me stop having periods, made me lose my libido, I put on weight, i was moody and emotional, had sore boobs etc etc. And that is only the beginning for some women.

There are diaphragms or IUD’s which again are only a women’s responsibility and we’ve all heard the horror stories.

There is the invasive and permanent surgical options for men and women but they are not an option for those who may want to bare children in the future.

There is the morning after pill, which is simply an overdose of the hormonal treatments mentioned above and has the accompanying overdose of side effects.

There is abortion with the mental, emotional, physical, hormonal and personal stress and trauma it can bring apon the woman.

And adoption, and all the associated life and body changing effects of carrying a baby full term.

In ALL THESE CASES IT’S THE WOMANS RESPONSIBILITY! Eg: two consenting adults fall into bed in a lusty passion or a drunken stupor or whatever. Neither partner mentions birth control for whatever reason. The man presumes that if she hasn’t asked for a condom she must be employing some other contraceptive method. Why cant the women presume the same of the man? Well baisically because even if he is wrong and the woman was not using any form of contraceptive the man will still continue his life over the following weeks probably never giving an unwanted pregnancy a second thought. But the woman cannot walk away. She spends the next 48 hours weighing up the likelihood of falling pregnant, wondering if its worth putting her body through the full on stress and turmoil of the morning after pill. Or having this life altering threat of unwanted pregnancy in the back of her mind until the day her period arrives and she can sigh relief.  It’s only her problem.

This issue sends me crazy.

Why the fuck should a woman have to turn her body upside down to stop herself getting pregnant from mens semen??!!? Why has someone not made better options that let men take responsibility. Why oh why is there no men’s contraceptive pill!!.

And if she decides to have the baby, after 9 months of living like a saint and having the whole wide world think they have rights to her body she gets rewarded with the joy of motherhood. If the guy who knocked her up didn’t turn out to be father material for whatever reason – TO BAD – SHE STILL GOTTA STEP UP AND PLAY MUMMA. For ever. And she better not make one tiny mistake because as a single mother – EVERYONE’S JUDGING HER!  

Ofcourse the man may “help her out” and do dad duty every other weekend, for which the world will nominate him for father of the year, while strangers tell the woman how lucky she is that ‘baby dada’ plays good time fun guy when it suits him. Meanwhile the man goes onto have succesful career and the woman is destined for part-time or casual jobs that fit around her parenting.

God forbid there are any taxes left after the greedy politicians get their perks, to help out the single mother and her child. Because if she takes a cent, she will NEVER HEAR THE END! And the government will be doing its best to pimp her out to the closest thing to husband material, in order to hand over any financial responsibility for this single mother and her child, effectively making her and her child completely dependent on any employed man that she dates in the future.

And everyone will judge her even more for shacking with a man who is not the father of her baby.

She gets to deal with ALL of this, it’s not negotiable.

Sexually active heterosexual women spend so much of their lives trying to navigate this shit and sexually active heterosexual men spend about 10 minutes every 5 years thinking about it. It sucks. And it is so much more than a need for better sex education and access to cheap birth control. Its massive.

And in the meantime, I dont want to hear anybody dare try argue against a women’s right to terminate a pregnancy. Not before I see men being forced to carry babies, have pregnancies and deal with birthing, equal parenting and equal birth control responsibilities.

*please note – I have used massive and over the top generalisations which are based on what we all fucking know. But these generalisations obviously do not apply to everyone or represent all experiences. Just a hell of a lot of them*

Venturing in-house

Tags

brothels, clients, laws, money, personal stories, sex industry, Sex Work, south australia, the boss

As I keep mentioning, my escort career didn’t last long before I went looking for greener pastures in other sectors of the industry. This is despite the fact that our boss would fill our heads with stories about the evils of working “in-house” (in brothels and parlours) in an attempt to keep us loyal. According to the stories from Pity Girls management, every brothel in Adelaide was filled with bikies and thieves and the cops raided nightly. But I was keen to explore opportunities in different territory within this new career I had just stumbled across. And although my mum wasnt keen on the idea of me hooking, she was trying hard to be supportive but couldn’t stop worrying about me. She was anxious about my safety visiting strangers at home, and was hassling me to work in-house where she thought there was less risk. I’d never felt scared while escorting, and wasnt concerned for my own safety, but I have to admit there were things I didn’t like about being in other people’s space.

And what the hell. I already had a criminal conviction thanks to my stint as a receptionist in a massage parlour, so what did I have to lose.

I called a phone number of a woman I had met through some other workers and made a time to meet her for an interview. She was an ex worker herself, and ran a small discreet little brothel from a townhouse on the outskirts of the city. I started working for her pretty much immediately and found myself settled in to this new style of working very quickly.

It was great. The business was only open during the day, and two of us “girls” would be on shift (escorts seem to be called “ladies” and brothel workers were called “girls”, not sure why, just one of those things to add to my collection of sex industry norms and nuances) and we would take it in turns seeing the walk in’s and appointments. Our boss would answer the phone calls, make our appointments, greet our clients, clean our rooms, make our beds after our bookings, scrub the shower every time it was used, wash, dry and fold fresh fluffy towels for us and make us cups of tea. All we had to do was fuck and watch day time soapies.

On top of that I got payed more money per hour than I did when I was escorting, I didn’t have to waste time driving round from booking to booking, and the place was super busy!

I also found I really prefered the actual work in-house compared to the work as an escort, it was quite different. Inviting clients into my space, instead of going into their space allowed me to be in complete control. It allowed me to take the lead,  develop a routine and really highlighted the service side of the booking.

In a brothel I show them to the bedroom, I tell them to get undressed and lay on the bed, When I return after putting the money away my client is usually on the bed, naked on their tummy waiting for their massage. This was very different to escorting. Apart from the fact that I know my shower and towels are clean, my room is set up how I want it, I have my own music playing, and I’m not worried about a wife coming home or kid waking up!

My clients were mostly business men on their lunch break, the service simple and it just felt more like a job compared to escorting, which sometimes resembled a long trashy random drunken party where I’m the only one sober.

And again, the money was GREAT! Ahhhhh those were the days, working 10am till 4pm and going home with $500 in my pocket. Reliable, easy, hassle free wads of cash. Times have changed for us all now, and money in the sex industry is nothing at all like reliable!

I worked 3 days a week and life was good.

The police didn’t raid daily, but we knew they visited us undercover, and would occasionally park down the road and pull our clients over for questioning. Back in these days (late 1990’s) there were two ways of getting enough evidence for a prosecution (the days the laws are the same, but the rules of evidence and the ‘court made law’ have changed a little bit – but still just as shit). One way to ‘bust us’ was to send in an undercover cop posing as a client in order to get a worker to admit they will exchange sex for money. The other way was to intimidate enough clients into making statements about a particular worker or the brothel.

So my boss taught us the tricks of the trade, how to make sure you don’t fuck yourself over with the cops and (more importantly for her) not fuck the business over in the process.

Golden rule #1.We must NEVER tell a new client what we do or don’t do in the service. We must follow the script and NOT allow ourselves to be tricked into saying anything more. Even if it means the client walks and we lose the booking. Their money is worth the risk.

Example script:

Me: “It’s a fully inclusive service and its $90 for half an hour and $150 for an hour.”

Client “What’s a fully inclusive service?”

Me: *patting the bed, and smiling* “It’s a full service”

Client: “Do I get sex?”

Me: *nodding, patting the bed* “I’ll have to say no to that, but it IS a fully inclusive service”

If they couldn’t understand the secret code of ‘full service’ + bed + high cost + worker in mini skirt + knowing look or if they didn’t want to take the risk of parting with good money for some unknown service, then, we both miss out. Or, if they really wanted to talk shop we could undress them first and make them ask their questions standing in front of us naked (apparently a cop wont undress). But even then, we weren’t a fan of that option because we didn’t want to encourage perverts coming in just to flash their bits at us with no intention of staying. So we only offered that option in specific circumstances.

But also because if a potential client couldn’t understand our need for discretion then we couldn’t trust them with our secret. If they didn’t get that we need to keep our mouths shut, then how could we expect them to keep their mouths shut when being hassled by the cops. And we knew the cops would intimidate them, threaten to tell their wives or bosses, try anything to get them to make a statement against us.  All idle threats, but effective just the same.

So our other main tactic or golden rule #2, for those clients who did pay and stay, even for our regular clients, every single person who paid for sex in our brothel, would be “briefed” on their way out. Our boss would eavesdrop on us while we showed our clients to the door to make sure we were doing it. We hated briefing them, because it filled our clients with often unnecessary fear, and took away from the shiny happy feelings our clients usually have when leaving our company. It scared come clients shitless and probably stopped many coming back. But it was necessary. Forewarned is forearmed.

“Now, just remember, if anyone ever stops you outside of here and asks you what you were doing here, just say that you had a massage only. If you don’t say anything, and I don’t say anything, neither of us can get in trouble. Remember, you just had a straight massage, my clothes were on and so were your jocks” *smile sweetly, kiss on the cheek* “look forward to seeing you next time.” Send them out in the big bad world and hope for the best.

I was grateful for my time there and to have learnt these tactics because we never did get raided in the 12 months I worked there, but we definitely turned away lots of suspected undercover cops. And spending more time with other sex workers in the staff room and less time with drivers on the road meant I learnt so much about the work, the industry, the clients and ourselves. I really enjoyed the comradery of the “girls room” (staff room). The skills and knowledge that I learnt from my “apprenticeship” at this brothel are still useful to me all these years later, and form the basis of much of the ‘tricks of the trade’ that I pass down to the new sex workers that I meet in my travels.

Lady Baby

Tags

clients, escort, money, personal stories, sex industry, Sex Work

Before I left escorting I decided to give day shift a go. I liked day shift, the clients were more civilised even though there were less of them. I didn’t mind though because I’d often be the only worker on shift and the agency would let me work from home which meaning I could hang out at home and my driver would pick me up when I got a booking and drop me back after rather than me having to sit at the agency all day.

It was on one of these day shifts that had my first ‘fetish’ client. As was the annoying norm at this agency, I was given no warning about what to expect from this booking even though he was probably promised someone who was experienced and ready to provide the specialty service that he requested. With only a name, the booking length and price and a driver who knew the address and phone number, I accept the booking and wait for my driver to collect me.

My driver  delivered me to the dodgy ‘pay by the hour’ motel. The one with the mirrored ceilings and filthy carpets. At least I didn’t need to be concerned about standing out as i walked through the reception of this cheap motel. Me in my trashy nightclub clothes in broad daylight. Carrying my tiny little hooker bag, just enough room for condoms, massage oil and lube (before the time of mobiles phones). Clip clopping around on my high heels i eventually find the right room.

*knock knock knock* on the door. Adjust my skirt, push up my boobs, fluff my hair, head up, smile bright, tummy in, tits out… and…… *door opens*

I am never sure what to expect from behind the closed doors, I don’t usually think too much about it. All I hope to see is a person with cash who is clean and happy to see me. Sometimes I see business suits, sometimes i see blue collars, sometimes i see party T shirts, sometimes i see bare skin and nakedness. Even at this early stage of my career, there wasnt much I thought would surprise me. And when this client answered the door, I pretended to not be surprised.  From the ground up, I saw bare feet and bare legs – OK naked man. I’m used to this. Next up… a nappy (or a diaper for you americans). Yep, he was wearing a nappy. A cloth nappy with huge big nappy pins. Umm……quick regroup – so, I’m seeing an adult baby client. OK. I heard about this, i can do this. Straight face, not a flinch of surprise to give away my lack of experience. Remember my motto ‘fake it till you make it’.  Keep my eyes moving up, bare tummy, to be expected on a baby on a hot day, and eyes moving upward –

HOOOOOLD UP! A pink lace bra. Ok, this I could not comprehend. A nappy AND  a bra?

I couldn’t help myself, I burst into laughter.

“A baby in a bra? are you a baby or a lady?”

He just smiled. So my ultra professional, nothing shocks me, exterior somewhat diminished, he lets me in, seemingly happy by my taunting. He removed his oversized dummy from his mouth and asked me if I was ok with it (‘it’ being his choice of clothing i presumed) while handing me his cash. Ofcourse I was ok with it. You are wearing a nappy and a bra, and you’re clean and you have money and you’re smiling. Im fine with it!

As a boring vanilla service supplying whore, this was definitely an interesting booking. He wet his nappy, ok, I can change it for him. He wanted me wear the wet nappy, nope, I draw the line at that. He wanted me to feed him a bottle, no problems. He wanted me to wear a clean nappy and wet it myself, nope, no thanks. He wanted me to wee on him but I knew my bladder would not oblige. He offered me extra money, still I declined. He offered even more and more and more money, but I know my body, my bladder gets stage fright, I knew that  no amount of money would convince my bladder to let go of control whilst squatted over an adult baby in a pretty pink bra. But it was clear he needed to be relieved of his money so I finally agreed to go to the toilet in front of him. On the toilet. Not on him, nor in his nappy. He watched as I trickled, he was a very happy baby.

We spent the rest of the booking playing baby games and being an affectionate mummy.  I gave him hugs and kisses and the hour ticked over.

Fantasy play finishes like clockwork 10 mins before the end of the booking and I showered and jumped back into my drivers car, giggling to myself. My driver could see my amusement but I didn’t say a word, a good hooker doesn’t kiss and tell (untill years later in an anonymous blog). I added the experience to the growing collection of memories that have been teaching me about human sexuality and psychology. Feeling honored to share in so much of the unspoken (and happy i made extra money)

And it’s still good for a story.

Pro’s and Con’s

Tags

clients, escort, money, personal stories, Sex Work, stigma

I was at Pity Girls for about 8 months in total. It was escort only, based at a no frills office building in the centre of the CBD with a nice big car park. It had a small office used as the phone room where the receptionist took the phone calls, a bathroom with a shower which was in need of a clean and ofcourse the ‘girls room’ which is the lounge where the workers hung out between jobs. It had a big tacky old modular lounge, a day bed with a single mattress and pay TV (a novelty to me back then). Typically there would be a coupla sprawled out bodies sleeping while we waited, a stiff looking driver pacing around or staring at the tv alert and waiting for the next job and a bunch of fast food wrappers, overflowing ashtrays and empty lemon rusky bottles. On a quiet night there would probably be another driver and some workers out in the car park listening to car stereos and sharing joints, bitching and giggling. On a busy night the place would be deserted and workers would be taken out early in the night and wont come back till daylight. While the escorts were mainly ‘ladies’, there were also ‘rentboys’ and ‘trannies’ as they were marketed in the industry back then. Of course most of our clients were men (but not all). In the phone room the receptionist  had our ‘description cards’ with our assigned hooker name, a set of random body measurements that rarely reflected our real body shapes, a vague romanticised description and a tickbox list of the ‘extras’ each of us may offer (usually for extra cost) or our do’s and donts, these might include – kissing, toys on you, toys on them, golden shower, role play, dominatrix, bi double, couples, anal. It was a pretty steep learning curve as i fumbled my way through my first few months, learning my new job. And while i certainly loved the lifestyle that sex work afforded me, I didn’t love it all. It takes a while to settle into a new job and figure out what you like about it, and what needs to change. But I did.

The Pro’s and Con’s of pity girls, escorting and sex work.

• I loved the disposable income.
• I hated the shit pay.
• I hated working all night.
• I hated wearing nightclub clothes in the daylight.
• I hated drunk groups of guys.
• I loved drunk lonely old men with gold credit cards.
• I hated going into fancy hotels looking like I don’t belong.
• I hated wandering around dark blocks of flats looking for the right number.
• I loved it when my driver walked me to the door, checked out the house first and took the money safely back to the car.
• I wasn’t so keen on sitting on my clients couches and talking to them politely waiting for them to take the lead to the bedroom.
• I hated fucking in their wives beds with photos of their kids on the walls.
• I hated doing group bookings where a couple of us workers would see a group of friends. We would stand awkwardly waiting while the clients would awkwardly try to figure out which one wanted to see who, trying to be nice to each other, trying not to offend the hookers, but not wanting to get stuck with the one they found unattractive, we didn’t care, we just wanted the to make a decision. And then often we would all be doing the deed in same room. We wouldn’t swap partners, but i still hated on the injustice of all these extra people seeing me fuck and not paying for it.
• I loved doing group bookings when I was with my trouble making friends. One night I remember my friend leaving the hotel room of a group of guys we had just seen and she was wearing their hotel’s plush towelling robe under her nightclub clothes, after she had spent the booking heckling the poor guys in the way that only she could do.  She cracked me up.
• I loved doing doubles and couples when I got paid twice as much for half as much work.
• I loved that my agency always took my side over the clients no matter what.
• I hated that my agency treated the clients like shit and encouraged us to the same.
• I hated my name. The receptionist on shift  named me at my interview because I couldn’t think of my own fake name. I was Chantelle. I chose a new fake name as soon as I left Pity Girls.
• I hated it when the receptionist promises the client a tiny Italian lingerie model with an accent just to get their commission, and then send me and I’m left dealing with the disappointed and grumpy client.
• I hated it if I got stuck in the car with a  dum driver for the whole night,  who drove slow making me  late for my bookings  and again leaving me to deal with an unhappy client.
• I loved getting my favourite driver, we would listen to all his cool cd’s and smoke pot and he made me laugh lots, and one time when a client cancelled me at the door because I wasn’t ‘his type’, my favourite driver told the client that he wasnt our  type either and we laughed hysterically as my driver demanded a cancellation fee. I loved him for that.
• I hated being rejected at the door, or sent to fake addresses.
• I hated driving all the way north from all the way south, wasting 2 hours on the road just for a half hour booking that only pays $35 bucks!

I hated that when I finally told my usually supportive, open minded mother what I was doing for a job, her response was a very angry and hurt: “how long before you stick a needle in your arm” *phone slams down*

I loved it how  eventually (days not weeks) my mum calmed down, sat down  and told me her concerns which led me to changing workplaces. I went ‘in-house’. I stayed a Pro, but I dumped a bunch of the cons!

Hooker Syndrome

Tags

false consciousness, friends and family, money, personal stories, queers, Sex Work, south australia, stigma

Back to the story so far. We were up to the bit where I start sex work and escorting at Pity Girls. At the time I was living in a share house with a bunch of students and queer folks. I wasn’t the first in my group of friends to experiment with sex work as an income option, and I wasn’t the last (and I’m not just talking about the women). I wasn’t shy about telling my friends what I did at the time as I had no shame, no hang ups and no guilt about my new job.

In fact the opposite. I was proud of myself. Here i was, 18 years old, just quit my check out chick job, spent my life thinking I was fat and unattractive, nowhere near as cool as my friends, broke, lots of dreams but not of lot of motivation, and within a week I making lots of disposable income, going shopping, buying new clothes, being sexually active, getting loads of compliments, experimenting, partying and i loved it.

And it’s not like my friends were conservative or negative about sex, i hung out with gay boys and lesbians, whores and hippies. My friends were artists and dole bludgers and uni students and other sex workers. And i had cash. Ofcourse everyone loves you when you have cash. And everyone loves to be loved, right? Well i certainly lapped up my new-found confidence, independence and POWER that having money and adoring followers (clients and unfinancial friends) gave me.

I was the epitome of the ‘happy hooker’.  I remember telling one of my friends what I did for a job and he replied with a very queer and high-pitched “ooooooohhh you’re a lady of the night!”. Everyone loved me, my money, my stories, my clothes, my my my my everything.

Oh except my closest friend. A gay guy I have been friends with since I was a child. Dont get me wrong, he loved it when I ordered us pizza and payed for it all. But he hated my new bigger and bolder attitude. I wasn’t his first friend to give sex work a go. And I wasn’t the last to come down with what he coined ‘hooker syndrome’.

Hooker syndrome. It isn’t describing a syndrome affecting a poor wilting victim with no choices. Nor an abused girl with a false consciousness. Nor is it a scary looking disease. It’s not a sex addiction. Hooker syndrome is not anything bad. Unless you’re the oldest friends of the person afflicted with this curious ailment.

According to my friend, hooker syndrome effected all new sex workers. It was a passing  syndrome that usually started in the first few shifts of someone starting sex work and lasted at least 3 months, usually up to 6 months. Hooker Syndrome refers to the annoying attitude that new hookers get, what – with our new-found confidence, cash, sexiness ‘take me or leave me just as i am cos i got plenty other options right here right now’ attitude.

Apparently, me and my hooker syndrome was unbearable. Which was fine by me, cos frankly I found their lack of disposable income and increasing debt they owed me to be unbearable  also.

I decided to move out from the share house because, all of a sudden, stable housing, rent payed on time, furniture owned outright and food in my cupboard became a reality for me, and I was becoming a growd up. While my friends were still complaining about cold fries in order to scam free McDonald’s and fleeing rental accommodations in the night.

Presumably my hooker syndrome was more bearable when I was flashing round the cash buying drinks for my friends at Mars (Adelaide’s only gay nightclub with ridiculously overpriced drinks) than it was when I was bitchily demanding they grow up and pay the rent, because I moved out into my own little place, but still partied all the time with my pals.

We have all grown up now (well mostly) and they are all still my friends (well mostly), and my hooker syndrome did settle down (well mostly) (you be the judge)

How I told my mother that her little girl is a sex worker, and what she said back to me, is a story for another time.