Episode 39: What Goes Around Comes Around

There is every reason to trust a man in his forties, who drives a Jeep and has several copies of The Economist magazine on the back seat. Such a man if he speaks in a deep voice, is collected when picking a girl, and genuinely seems  interested in your welfare gives the impression he is self assured; not one to play boyhood games of the twenties. But that is not always the case like I found last night.

This man picked me around eleven. He was very sober and looked by his dressing as if he had worked till late in the night. We drove to a discreet  Sh.8,000 a night hotel slightly out of town which is a favorite of relatively older men having some fun on the side. At the hotel he asked if I was hungry, and I said I couldn't mind a snack. He paid for a room and I went to locate it as he ordered  fish. I ate the fish in the room while he undressed and took a shower. I have to admit he was handsome.

By default a man is supposed to pay a girl  before she delivers the service. But then you have to judge each man individually. Once you agree on the amount there is no need to demand money upfront from a man who  looks like he can definitely pay.And if you plan to give your all then the hope is the man will pay you extra. Of course if you are in downtown Nairobi you can take such gambles, no matter how the man looks.

So I gave myself to him . He seemed to enjoy and so did I and thus we tried several things in the hour I had agreed to spend with him. After we were done, I took a shower, dressed up and asked for my pay which was also to include taxi charges. He reached for his trouser, removed a 200 shilling note , and gave it to me. I took it thinking he was looking for more. But he just dropped his trouser back to the bed.

 " Thanks" he said.

" So..?"

" What?"

"My money?"

" That is the amount I always pay prostitutes" he said in a calm manner, and deep voice which I kind of liked.

I lost my temper. And for the first time in career  I slapped a client hard on the face. He touched his jaw, then  went to the door opened it and told me to get out. He spoke slowly and confidently as if nothing had happened. Though in a fighting spirit I was not blinded by anger. From his look I knew he would have smashed me with his powerful hands. So I stepped out, but made sure to do the prostitute thing which is to shame a man by screaming and calling him names. But perhaps having swindled again he knew by locking his door and ignoring me, I would be thrown out by the hotel staff, who in such places tend to side with the man. That's exactly what happened.I was escorted to the gates still trying to create a scene.

Today when I think about it I feel a little foolish. One for trusting the man and two for causing unnecessary drama. I know I got myself marked by the hotel staff and definitely other potential clients which is not good for business. And then what goes around comes around. Perhaps I deserved it, for only the other day did I steal from a man.

Episode 38: Leaving To Chase Italians

Every week or so there is a girl leaving the Street never to come back. Sometimes a girl may experience some boredom and decide to take a break for a week, but the break ends up lasting forever. At other times a girl may hit a jackpot. For instance, either by fair or rough play, she hooks a “real rich honey” who helps her leap to a different social level. There are also girls who shift locations in search of greener pastures. A girl moving upward from the Street heads to an up market brothel or any of the emerging places within the lush estates which are accommodative to our trade. The latter is always a higher probability than the former because many of the up market brothels owners think a girl from the Street is stale, and not cultured enough to discreetly handle high net worth enough individuals. It’s not necessarily that such owners ask for a girl’s experience, but somehow they are able to tell  where a girl comes from even if she claims to be just out of college. One would think that there is a Street Mark engraved in our faces, but no, the tell tale signs are the distinct mannerisms which we acquire while here. These range from the vocabulary we use unconsciously to the way we pronounce “honey” even when we literally mean what is spread on bread.

The thing with coming and leaving the Street is that there are no ceremonies involved.. Perhaps if leaving the Street was something planned, there would be farewell parties; how such parties would look like can only be left to the imagination of the part of the brain that deals with insecurities and not the erotic section. But then, as I may have mentioned, leaving is not something to plan about; it just happens, more like accidental death. Of course if you are the concerned kind of john you will doubt me, because you may have heard the classical line “I plan to quit next month". This, for your information, is as rhetorical as saying “I am fine" in answer to “How are you?"

For me the most interesting part of leaving is when I meet a girl who has disappeared. It’s always a very pretentious situation. The conversations with the girls I have met always start with the girl trying to be indirectly dismissive of me. So she will say something in the lines of “So you are still chasing men". There is no way to put this sentence English and still retain its punch; a veiled rudeness said in a “Who in her right mind is still on the Street?” tone.

That aside from August and for the next three months is the period relatively more girls disappear or rather migrate. Its the tourist season and the time some of us go try their luck at the coast. So many stories circulate here about what happens there, but the most prominent and the ones often repeated have to do with hitting a jackpot. Almost all girls who migrate to the beaches never come back to the Street. Not necessarily because they have hit it, but I think its more out of  the shame of failure.

This year I plan to also go down to Malindi and hopefully have the Italians chase me. I have never done the tourist circuit and its one thing I believe I should do before I call it a day. It would be too much for me to expect me a jackpot so I will lower my expectations and say I am just going for the experience. One thing I am sure to do is come back to the Street whether I hit a jackpot or not.

Episode 37: Unhappy? Maybe Yes

Someone dropped me an email saying I am an unhappy prostitute. That reading all I have on this blog she saw nothing that hints at joy. I don’t talk of laughter and the few times I talk of happiness its in passing as if it is something not important in my life. The lady implied my blog rather than building a brand is a 'sad commentary' of a cheerless, heartbreaking life.  Well, I was not aware that my writing gives the impression of a totally unhappy person. But then what is the true position? Am I unhappy?

A significant source of happiness in any career is in doing what one enjoys. I do enjoy what I do, but I have to admit not as immensely as I used to say a year ago. What has changed? As I implied in the introduction of my ebook, I may have reached some sort of plateau. A point where I feel there is not much more to conquer, and if there is I am yet to figure it out. This is the point where you changes careers, else your productivity starts diminishing until to a point where the company needs you no more. I don't operate in such a formal structure, but for sure my productivity is down, and my employer may soon not need me. The problem is this is a career which has swallowed me; I don’t feel like quitting until I am literally laid down. In light of this I will acknowledge I am not as happy as I used to be.

Although I still have lots of interesting and rather challenging mental games with men, I don't clap when I triumph, neither do I grieve unnecessarily when I fail. I mean I have lost most of the emotions which come with winning and losing. I need new worlds to conquer. Certainly I know  that there is so much depth and complexity in my kind of work; I couldn’t have overcome everything there is. I just need to redefine my goals and the joy of triumph and pain of loss will possibly come back to me. Still I wouldn’t say I am an unhappy girl, but rather happy in a very plain way, like Meg, that girl in Family Guy.

What about the other kind of happiness? The obvious haha type? Each day I am on the street a girl will crack a joke or give an anecdote that will make me laugh, sometimes till I shed tears. But there is a hollowness and predictability in such humor. My laughter at such times is almost the kind Langston Hughes said was laughing to keep from crying. And this has nothing to do with the crude nature of the humor, but something about is not genuinely ticklish. It’s the same for clients with rusty jokes. That said once in a while I get a man who tickles me and I experience a good honest laugh. Like a man I was with recently. When I was on my fours he said “Why are you moaning? You should bark"

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I have answered some of the questions I have been asked. Click on the Ask Me page above to read.


-For those who have requested my ebooks and I have not gotten back to them, I will do that by the end of the day tomorrow. Many regrets for the delay. I am also working overtime to reply all my email and Facebook messages.


-Click the Ebooks page above to request for books.


Follow:
Twitter: @suenairobi
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Episode 36: Why Do You Sleep With Me?

There are two questions I always want to ask my clients. However, most of the times I don't get to because if I did, I’d cross a delicate line in the client girl relationship; that of minding my own business. I have no right, moral or otherwise, to go poking my nose in the private motives of my clients. Yet some of these motivations are of interest to me both for professional and private reasons. The top most question in my head wherever I am with a man is “Why are you sleeping with a prostitute?" There is no way I am able to frame this question without seeming to be standing on a higher ethical ground, of which I am not. Then again the benefits of answering such a question may not be obvious to a man. This is as compared to something like “Which position do you like best?” Nonetheless knowing why a man sleeps with me satisfies some curiosity inside me. Getting the answer also helps me align my spirits to what happens between the legs; this way I try able to give the man a sex session that corresponds to his deep needs. Also In some cases the answer reminds me of my relevance and gives me the morale to dress up on a cold evening and hit the Street.

The second question that I want to ask my client is “Why did you pick me, and not any other girl?" This is relatively easy to ask but awkward because when I do, I end up sounding like I have confidence and self esteem issues, and I am seeking to have my ego massaged. Certainly I have no confidence and self esteem issues but then it’s only natural once in a while to want someone to make a honest statement that will boost your sense of worth. Thus I ask this question hoping a man wont say " I picked you because you were nearest the door of my car", " I picked you because your price was lowest" or  " I picked you because you were freezing in the cold" or such other statements which hint at convenience and sympathy rather than something exceptional about my appearance or personality. Hence it does me a lot of good when a man says “I picked you because of your panache” or “the smooth way you puff your cigarettes was a turn on”, you know those kinds of sentences that touch on my self. 

In as much as I don't get to always ask either of the above questions I have always believed I know all the possible reasons that make men sleep with prostitutes. That was until I chanced on an essay titled The System of Collecting a month or so go. I was made aware of a new kind of man who I call the collector. Though the essay didn’t expressly say so, this is a man who has a list in his head or physically somewhere of the kind of women he endeavors to sleep with. Such a list may include; dreadlocked woman, professor over 50 years, with a bad sense of fashion, loud mouthed, very big ass, small ass, tomboy, illiterate, poor, smoker, deep voiced etc. Every time he sleeps with a woman fitting one of these attributes he crosses her from the list.

According to the essayist “A given woman stops being a woman and becomes no more than a vagina, a couple of breasts, a belly, a pair of thighs, a voice, a face – according to preference. Henceforth she is reduced to a set whose separate signifying elements are one by one ticked off by desire....."

Well the fact that I am a prostitute means that I already may be the above woman, but consciously thinking a man will cross me off some list after a session, leaves me in a nasty mood; feeling worthless. I know how silly it sounds for me to set some sort standards for myself when I am already considered to have sunk to one of humanities lows, but hey that is how I feel.

A collector may find prostitutes easy targets because the dealing is so business like and does not involve a chase. Then there are all kinds among us. We compete on uniqueness. We try to sound exotic by the way we talk and use of rare nicknames. At the risk of sounding proud I know for a fact there is one thing quite unique about me. The first time you talk or see me you note it. It’s not something many girls have. Whether the thing is good or bad will depend on an individual, but this makes me sure one of those odd men with lists is looking for my kind.


Getting crossed out from a list is my new fear. The problem is I have found no foolproof way to know whether a man is a collector or not. Not that I would do much if I knew, but at least if I proved he is not I would feel good. For the last two weeks I have been giving my number to clients I suspect to be collectors rather easily. If a man does not call or send a text I assume he is one.Of all those I have given my number none has gotten in touch with me. So now though I try to keep my head high I feel like an item, crossed off some list. It could be also I am being too eccentric or losing my mind.


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I have answered some of the questions I have been asked. Click on the Ask Me page above to read.

For those who have requested my ebooks and I have not gotten back to them, I will do that by the end of the day tomorrow. Many regrets for the delay. I am also working overtime to reply all my email and Facebook messages.


Click ebooks to request for books.


Follow: 

Twitter: @suenairobi
Facebook: Sue Maisha.

Episode 35 : Of Boredom and A Funeral

I have been in my kind business for almost three years now, during which I have slept with over a thousand different men. That figure is small as compared to some of you, men and women, who do it for pleasure, ego and money. Let’s not go to the money bit, but do take some few seconds to count the number of people you have slept with. How many? Yet you may not be called prostitutes because it is not the quantity of the sex that matters in the definition of the word, but the purpose.

Nowadays I am not ashamed to call myself a prostitute. But there was a time I was in denial. Even after walking to a dingy room at the Sabina Joy, lying on dirty tattered mattress, lowering my pants, having a drunken man mount me and pay 200 shillings for it, I still could not punch my fist in the air and say “Yes I am now a prostitute!”. Those days are now gone, they had to go if I had to make it in this trade.

Of course I remember the way I felt the first day I was explicitly paid for sex. The thrill of becoming something new. And this was not the becoming a woman pain then  joy of virginity breaking, but the science fiction metamorphosis of changing to evil in the eyes of society, losing almost all conscience and morality. There was every reason to remain in denial.

As you well know I practice on the Street. There are many other places I could opt to go to, where I won’t freeze in cold or have to play hide and seek with the police and City Council askari, but I chose the Street. The Street has its own beauty. To start with, there is the ever present tension between us and the authorities, a permanent adrenaline rush that makes getting to a comfortable zone an impossibility. A comfort zone would blind me from the fact that I can’t be in this trade forever. (Like most girls say I was to quit after six months.) The adrenaline rush, as you will see, has other purposes.

The Street is a jungle; there is no formality or systematic way of doing things. I am doing wrong and I have the freedom to go all the way in my sin. I can show as much flesh as I want, I can scream and insult. In some of the pubs I can’t even show my pants. In others I have to wait in the toilets or corridors. In the up market brothels there is structure; there is reporting to someone; there is splitting the money. I love my freedom and the risks that come with it. And I gladly pass the cost of the risk to the consumers.

The Street largely caters for a very specific market. Most men who come here are looking for something between the roughness of the downtown and decency of the up market. They don’t want the sophistication that snatches the illegality and dirt of prostitution. But still they don’t want the on the face prostitution that feels cheap and exploitative. I love this group because nothing is exactly predictable with them and they have endless possibilities. Many of them think  they have figured us out while the truth is they are far from it. The mind game between me and such is part of the motivation to do what I do

So why am I telling you things I should have told you at the start of this blog?  And some which you already know? It’s because of late I am looking back a lot. I am spending quite some time in the comfort of the good-old-days thoughts. In the last few weeks the Street has lost its thrill; the excitement and adrenaline rush that partially attracted me to it are nowhere to be found. Everything now is too predictable. The girls are good to each other. The clients, at least my clients, are too polite, they don't argue, they don't negotiate and they don’t experiment either. They have become yes-men agreeing to all I suggest. Not that johns are supposed to be monsters, but neither are they supposed to be sissies. A not so direct reward in my work, as I have mentioned, is the joy of outsmarting a man or better still subduing him. Presently everything looks too ideal. Too good to be true. It’s like a lull before a storm. I don't know what has happened. Maybe the cold has frozen the male nerves. Or the increasingly tough economic times have made men frail.

In these generally slow times I and certainly most girls seize any opportunity to get some kick. Not long ago this opportunity came in the form of death. Most girls approach death with escapism and false bravado. Thus there are many statements of the “ I'd rather die than….” kind. Or others which tend to play on fate and destiny. Hence many times I will hear the very pedestrian statement “My graph is drawn"... Although girls may give the illusion they are not afraid of death and prefer it to suffering, the truth is most of us are scared and the light manner in which most of us treat it, is so as not to face the reality of how close we are to demise every time we go with a client. Like most people I am also frightened, but rather than live in escapism I have opted to reconcile myself with the idea of death.

About a year ago I read The Book of Dead Philosophers (another relic from a client.). The text has all these anecdotes about philosophical last scenes. My favorite was the well known classic by Socrates. When he was sentenced to death he told the judges “Now it is time that we were going, I to die and you to live; but which of us has the happier prospect is unknown to anyone but God."

Then there was another man whose name I can't remember who after it became clear he was going to die of cancer said “Death orders matters well, since the very fact of your absence makes the world distinctly less worthy of being lived in"

Few weeks ago a colleague we called BG died. She was one of those average girls who don’t stand out in anyway. She disappeared from the Street for a month, and the next thing we heard she was dead.  Like it usually happens here there was speculation but nothing definite about the cause of her death. So there was talk of her being poisoned by another girl, of her being bewitched by a man he stole from, of HIV, of drugs and liver disease.

Twenty three of us planned to attend the burial.  Of course we said we were going to show our last respects but it’s the prospect of taking a trip as a group that was more exciting. It was to be like those bonding retreats corporate organizations have. Maggie who was coordinating the trip laid the ground rules. We were to all wear black jeans. When we got to the funeral we were not to act like prostitutes but rather like her ‘work’ colleagues, since we were not sure whether her family knew what she did for a living. We contributed money and hired two Nissan Matatus. The funeral was in Muranga, about 100km from Nairobi.

We left around nine in the morning. As soon as we were inside the vehicle, we opened our bags and unleashed cheap spirits and miraa. Half an hour later we were euphoric and noisy as if going for a wedding. We talked, laughed, smoked, farted and made rude and suggestive signs at other motorists. We were almost knocked out by the time we got to the funeral and as much as we tried to maintain some decorum it became impossible. We were loud, and some of us giggled when mourners were praying.

When the coffin was lowered inside the grave, we took over to throw in the soil. With the spades which were provided, singing and trying to look sober we buried BG. When the grave was fully covered we stood around it, ignoring everyone else. Then Maggie took the microphone and looked directly at the grave. She spoke in Kikuyu but said something like “Please watch over us". At that point some of us shed tears. I didn’t.

When we went back to the vehicles, which were parked some distance away, we found someone had broken in and stolen our bags which contained our strong drinks. “Whoever stole our bags is the one who killed BG" Maggie said, and we cheered. Next day it was back to the present slow of the Street.


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Now I have two ebooks:

1.Nairobi Nights One - This has Episode 1-30 as they appear on the blog. Some selected comments are included. This book is FREE.




2. The Illustrated Nairobi Nights - This includes 20 Episodes told a graphic form. More like an advanced comic strip.Characters involved are drawn and in some cases much more information is given. There is also a tongue in cheek illustration of some of the comments. This book costs Ksh.100 (1.14$)


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