Prostitutes and Strippers

Walking along Main Rd in Green Point the other night, I noticed the prostitutes. I had seen women before standing on the street corners. They appeared to be waiting for someone, a friend I assumed, to pick them up and go out somewhere. They are indeed waiting for someone, but not the kind of friend I had assumed. I hadn't noticed them as prostitutes before because most of them are wearing the same sort of clothes other women wear. There was one who was dressed in a more flamboyant costume, but when we passed her, she looked as if she may be transgender. One of the reasons I finally noticed it the other night was because one of the women who was waiting on the corner started walking toward a car that had pulled over. As she was walking to the car, it hit me, then she opened the passenger door and stuck her head into negotiate. At this point we passed on the sidewalk, and then a minute later the car passed us with both of them inside and she was directing him to turn onto a side residential street. She was wearing jeans and a jean jacket. This part of Main Rd in Green Point in Cape Town doesn't have shop fronts, just the entrances to apartment buildings and built up walls surrounding the buildings.

Now that I've noticed it, I see them all the time in the evening and at night. Normally dressed women standing on the sidewalk and on the corners waiting. They don't seem to talk to the people walking on the street.

There is an investigative journalism TV show “Special Report” on Tuesday nights. This week was about strippers in South Africa. Back in Portland, Oregon I know at least some strip clubs don't pay the strippers and the only money they make is from tips, lap dances, and private dances. The industry is completely unregulated here and the women extremely taken advantage of. In addition to not paying the dancers, the women have to pay weekly or daily tariffs in order to work at a club. Then they are fined for things such as being a few minutes late or having their make-up slightly off. In some of the clubs, they are forced into prostitution. The private booths have locks and the fees for working at the club are so high they have two choices: to leave and work somewhere else or to have sex with their customers. Some chose to leave and find another club to dance at and others decide to slip across the line into prostitution.