Many men are attracted to picking girls from the streets because of the freedom to choose where to have sex with them. Unlike girls in downtown bars and brothels who insist on having sex in-house; in stuffy rooms and tattered mattresses, the girls on the streets are more risk inclined to go where a man wishes. Not that we have much choice. When I get inside a car I usually have no idea where a man will take me. It may sound stupid, but it’s a foolishness I charge a premium price for. A man may consider such factors as cost, privacy, and convenience in determining the destination.
Men don’t say where they are taking me until I ask. Their assumption may be that a girl on the street is ready to go anywhere. Perhaps they also fear a girl may change her mind if told of the destination. True there are places a girl would be uncomfortable going to. For instance near a neighborhood where she stole from a client. Also in a hotel where she was short-changed, created a scene and embarrassed the hotel. Some men love going to a prostitute’s house. This perhaps is driven by the image of prostitutes in movies; husky-voiced, cigarette-smoking women, living in dim candle-lit rooms, with some erotica hanging on the wall next to the bed. The truth is girls here don’t live that way.
Most of the girls downtown live in congested neighborhoods which are slightly above the state of slums. If you asked a girl at the Sabina Joy where she comes from the answer would be Kayole, Githurai, Huruma, Mwiki, Mathare North, or Mlango Kubwa. If not it would be a place like Gachie or Wangige. Few girls if any admit coming from the slums. To some extent, it’s an ego thing, and to another, it’s about what such a discovery may do to business; what with the stereotype of prostitutes and slum residents as thieves. A prostitute from the slums will not only be assumed to be dirty but also exhibit the worst of prostitutes’ treachery.
Here on the street, the opposite happens. Few girls admit to living in the estates where the downtown brothels girls live. Doing so would snatch the slight decency expected of girls on the streets. However, in actuality, there are some of my colleagues here who live in such estates, even in slums. Though such low-income places may offer convenience in terms of cost, they are a big inconvenience when it comes to the logistics of business. Life in such areas is characterized by arbitrary police round-ups, what is called msako. Woe unto you if you are caught in the msako when leaving for work. Besides the msako there is always a high possibility of bumping into policemen on patrol. Police in such areas have a superiority complex that tries to exploit the perceived inferiority of the residents. They are certain to arrest or harass you for no good reason. Thus if you live there you might be forced to leave home before dark for work. And if you work here on the street where business doesn’t pick up till after eleven, there is just too much time to kill, time which could have better been spent sleeping.
A brighter move, and which many of us have adapted is to live, as we put it, near the money. Thus we pick relatively decent places, slightly expensive but with some comfort and peace of mind. After all, if you have to spend the night in cold, chasing cars and shouting honey then you need to enjoy the fruits of your labor in calm. So you will find several girls living in Pangani, Westlands, Buru Buru, Kariobangi South, and Kiambu town. At times two or three girls will come together and rent a two or one-bedroom house in an upmarket place.
I live in a bed-sitter in Pangani. It takes about twenty minutes or so to get to town, and I can leave or get in the house at any time. I guess none of my eleven neighbors knows what I do for a living. Although the watchman may have a clue because of my odd hours, he doesn’t ask any questions. I like it that way, having to live without announcing to everyone what I do for a living. I love the beauty of living alone. The joy of those moments when I stagger home towards daylight and crash on the bed, or those times when I am seated on the floor of the toilet vomiting as a result of a bad hangover. No matter how the night has been, I usually find solace in my house. It is a special place, sacred in its way. And for that reason, I made a rule to preserve it only for myself. But rules get broken.
The duration between 3.45 am and 5 am is one of desperation. If a man hasn’t picked you by the time, then some despair sets in. That does not mean a girl cannot be picked within those hours, she can, but the quality of men who visit the street at that hour is not the best. Most have been partying all night long, are drunk, demanding, and hard to negotiate with. The sober ones are likely to have emotional problems and are rather unpredictable. If there is a serial killer hour, then that is.
Some time ago a man picked me up in his car a few minutes after four. He was in a suit, good-looking and sober. He told me he was from outside Nairobi. He was on a business trip but booked in a hotel with his family. He said he only had a thousand on him, not enough to book a room and pay me. Could we go to my house and at the end of it give me the whole amount? he posed. I didn’t think of it twice. I was financially cornered. I said yes, reasoning one man would make no difference.
We had a twenty minute session. Dressed up he said he couldn’t find the money in his pockets, and then pulled one of the oldest tricks in the book. “I left the money in my car,” he said. I followed him to the car which was parked outside the gate. I stood a short distance away. I watched him bend over as if looking for the money under his seat. Then all at once the engine started, and he was gone before I knew it. I wanted to shout thief and have him stopped before he accessed the main road. But I held my breath. Even if he was stopped someone would ask:” What has he stolen?”
Never again have I serviced a customer in my house. And never will I.
