Just over the Bez Valley border, in a street lined with gum and oak trees, rich with birdlife, women congregate in pairs or small groups on the pavement outside large Observatory properties. They are aged between 18 and 40 and come from South Africa, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Angola, the DRC, Malawi and Zambia. They live in Observatory, Yeoville, Bellevue East, Bez Valley, Bertrams, Kensington, Orange Grove and Vorna Valley. There is a loose affiliation between the women, and a pecking order. South African women get first preference for rooms in a guest house on Louis Botha Avenue, which are rented out at R50 an hour or R30 for half an hour. Clients are “Whites, Indians, Nigerians, all kinds…We don’t know them, we don’t ask questions unless they say they want to spend some life with you or if they propose you. That’s when they will tell you about their history. Then they will tell you, I come from India, or from London, or from Australia. Others lie to us.”
The younger women insist on condoms; the older women are more willing to compromise if they are paid enough. Fees range from R100 to R600. Younger sex workers are expected to pay compensation - often at knifepoint - if an older woman loses a regular client because of them. Sometimes they are forced to give up all their earnings.
Sibongile is Zimbabwean. Her mother lives in Zimbabwe and her father lives in Johannesburg. Since he married a South African woman, her father has failed to support her. She lives with her stepsisters who don’t know what she does. “They think I am chilling and working at Bruma for those Chinese shops.” She works on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays and generally has about four clients a day. Evidence, also a Zimbabwean, is 18. She came to South Africa two years ago on her own. Both her parents are dead and she has no family. “This thing is a risk. I am doing it because of my situation. Otherwise I must sleep in the streets.”
*Not their real names.
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