Tag Archives: sex industry

Second day with Seranna

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I met Seranna today at her hotel and talked her about two hours. We talked about how the shooting went last day. She said that they were supposed to shoot the sex workers at G.B. Road but could not because the sex workers and brothel owner did not allow her. She just talked them, actually she did not understand much about what they were talking about because the shooting crew was not good with the translation work. They talked to the sex workers but most of the time they did not transalte. She said it was okay and she was happy with what she was getting.

Seranna said that the brothel owner charged her Rs. 20,000 ($450) just to get them in and organize aten minutes dance show by sex workers. They did not let her shoot this dance part or anything inside the brothels. She was still happy with whatever happened. I am sure she is very cool and happy girl:). I see this as a mistake of crew members. When I had worked for CBC and MTV Italy, we did a research first so this way everything was very well organized. But with this documentary nothing is organized. I did not like it at all.

Seranna said that after spending few minutes at brothel, the Police came asking for bribe to Seranna. I don’t know what reason they wanted bribe for, or maybe because Seranna did not have a legal permission to make a documentary which is going to be commercialized. I am sure crew members did not tell her about it either. The cameraman is very famous guy but I don’t know how these people can make this big mistakes. Seranna said that everything went well with her and she was so happy with the progress.

I had asked Seranna to bring some sex toys and she has brought a lot of didlo and fake pussy. Few of them will be give to me to use for my NGO. I had never seen it in front so I was exited to see them. She showed me by wearing this fake pussy. It was so funny. She said that she uses those toys to educate people about safe sex practices. I believe that these kind of things get attention and then you can make people hear what you want them to. I liked the toys a lot.

Seranna said that the crew members do not want me to come to the shooting for whatever reasons but Seranna wanted me to go the shooting today but I said no. Seranna is going to interview two high class sex workers, a politician and going to a conference organized by Delhi university about sex work in India. We will fly to Kolkata tomorrow to attend the conference. I am excited for it.

First day of work with Seranna

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Finally I arrived Delhi this morning and went straight to Chandan’s place and then to see Chottala. Seranna had asked me to meet her at 4 o’clock so I could not spend much time with Chottala. I was not happy leaving him. I was supposed to meet Seranna at G.B. Road, brothel no. 71. Chandan drove me there. We reached there and I said Chandan to leave started looking for the brothel no. 71. G.B.Road is near the Ajmeri gate side of New Delhi railway station and is the biggest market of generator parts of Asia. Brothels and this biggest market of Asia was on the same road.

All the shops were at ground floor and brothels were at first floor. I sent a message to Seranna informing her about I had reached there but she did not reply me. I thought that maybe she was busy with shooting. I thought it would be good experience just to walk around so I did not stay near the no. 71 brothel. All the steps going up side to the brothels had few girls wearing all the makeups, calling to the people. I was also called up by several sex workers. They were all very well dressed but I could easily see that they were not healthy.

A lot of sex workers were at the windows and they were also doing the same thing: calling people upstairs. I went to a tea shop and sat there for an hour. All these sex workers were calling people like:- hey black pants; come upstairs, hey blue shirt, Rs.100 only, hey you look tired come to me… Each and every person walking on that road would look at least one to the windows. Now I had spent more than an hour so I thought to start walking. I noted something very strange that there was no education posters and writing about HIV or other STDs in the whole area. I wandered almost all over the sex working area but saw only two posters teaching about condoms and HIV. This was very sad.

As I stood-up, I saw one guy running. I asked few people they said that he was inside a brothel and he was looted by the sex workers. I had heard of the sex workers at brothels looting their clients but I never believed it. I had asked several people about it who go to brothels and all of them said that they never carry any extra cash or any valuable stuffs with them when they go to brothels because sex workers loot their clients sometimes, specially if they are new. I think it is only because sex workers for the brothel owner and give a big cut of their income to the owner so they never make much money.

After spending few more time now I was stopped by a pimp who wanted to sell me a girl. He just came to me and started walking next to me. He asked me would I like to have a girl and I said no and then he was like I will charge only Rs. 200 and give you a very nice girl, young and beautiful. I told him several times that I did not need a girl but he was kept walking next to me and asking the same question again and again. Finally he left me and a new and the most dangerous pimp appeared: the police. They probably did not want to sell me a girl but maybe, who knows.

They came and asked several questions about my identity. It was okay but I was wondering why did they stop me? I was never stopped before at any place in Delhi. There must be some reason behind it. Maybe they wanted me to ask them for a girl. I saw many many young guys, only 13-14 years old, going to the brothels. They all looked kind of afraid going in but they went. Now after spending more than two and a half hours finally Seranna called me and said that she had left her mobile in her car so she was not the texts I was sending her. She asked me to meet her tomorrow. I am so excited for this meeting.

Tawayaf culture in Varanasi

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An anthropology student from University of Pittsburgh, USA wrote me. My friend Adam Sergent, a anthropology student from University of Chicago had given my contact to Megan. Adam stayed at my guest house 1 month ago while he was learning Hindi in Benares.

Megan was interested in Tawayaf culture, prostitutes and HIV. Adam had told her about my NGO so she was looking to hear my experience working for it. It was Megan’s 4th year of research and she was looking to have as many contacts as she can for the next and last year of her research. I was surprised to listen her talking about Tawayafs. It really made curious about Tawayaf culture. I already knew a little bit about them but never thought that I must know more about them. Now I will research about it.

She said that she was already working with a NGO in Benares that works with prostitutes in Benares but she wanted to contact NGOs in other cities also. I knew few NGOs in Azamgarh and Mau and I gave their contacts to Megan. She wanted me to give her a written document saying that Megan is working with prostitutes, Tawayafs and HIV in Benares because it would help her getting grant from Univeristy. I will contact my leagl advisor first and if possible I would help Megan. We discussed a lot about our experiences and have decided that we would work together in future.

Tourist in Varanasi meets a Pimp

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I had a tenant from DC named Nick Chang. He was a Taiwanese but had green card of USA. He was a software Engineer. He was a Buddhist and wanted to visit few Buddhist sites in India. He wanted to visit Sarnath so I suggested him to hire a auto rickshaw for round trip. But he was uncomfortable doing it because he thought that he would not be able to meditate if somebody was waiting for him. I knew that it could be a hassle for a foreigner to deal with our auto rickshaw driver so again I suggested him to take a auto for round trip but he was not interested. I called Raju, the driver whom I hire always, to take Nick to Sarnath. Raju left him at Sarnath and came back.

Returning time Nick hired another auto which was quiet expensive than Raju’s auto. Nick said that he had reserved the whole auto but rickshaw driver let other people come. It was not so bad but definitely not good either. Driver stopped auto at railway station for a while saying that he wanted to buy something and when he came he had a young girl with him who also sat next to Nick. Driver started auto and this girl started touching Nick. Then driver asked Nick if he would like to sleep with that girl. Nick immediately said No but driver was kept telling him to go with that girl.

First he asked for Rs. 5000, then 4000,3000 and finally his last price was only Rs. 1000 for an hour. Nick never wanted to go with her so he never seemed a interested party to driver. Finally he asked for Rs. 500 to spend sometime in auto and Nick again said no but this driver just wanted Nick to buy that girl any how.

By the way when driver felt that Nick would not buy the girl, he stopped auto about 3 KMs before the place where Nick had to go. He said that his auto had some problem that he could not driver it any more. He said that Assi, where he had to go, was only 3 minutes of walk from the place he had stopped auto. Nick just wanted to get rid of it and he thought that Assi was really 3 minutes of walk so he left the auto. But he had to walk for over 30 minutes to get to my home.

Nick was stressed with his first day in Benares and I was shocked to see this new form of prostitution in my hometown. I had heard about prostitutes at Railways station but never realized that they are this much active and auto drivers are their touts.