BEHIND THE SCENES

Hiring a prostitute
Alfred P. Dizon

It would be interesting if Mayor Peter Rey Bautista would personally make the rounds in Baguio nightspots and see these characters who flaunt their city government IDs in these establishments to harass owners or get discounts for drinks.

These characters, I hear, demand that they be seated with the prettiest GROs particularly in “all the way” establishments which leave no room for imagination. Yes, these nightspots are dime a dozen in the city of pines and when the ladies whisper with perfumed breaths to their mesmerized customers, the cash registers start ringing.

Lest I be accused of shooting below the hip, I would like to give a tip to the police where these sleazy places are, since it seems, nobody among the lawmen minds these. Some, our bubwits say, are too busy visiting gambling dens for some coins. Small change, as compared to jueteng protection money, but enough for small-time grafters.
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Nightspots in Baguio are bullish and according to the owners, they have the best and prettiest girls imported from the Visayas or the Bicol Region. It is no wonder, government officials from other regions who have an eye for beauty schedule their so-called seminars in Baguio particularly at this time of the year when the cold Siberian breezes start blowing and the mood is ripe for romance.
Maybe Commission on Elections big boss Benjie Abalos should have come up to Baguio for rest and recreation instead of going to Zhenzhen, China and spared too much attention.

If he did that, he would not have become more popular and wouldn’t have been a pathetic figure trying to parry allegations of sexcapades or payoffs for the NBN broadband deal. I doubt if Abalos, at his age, would have been able to do it to two young, pretty and energetic women in a day. Kalla piman haan pay nga makatakder.
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If he could have made a quick trip to the city for some night fun, the beleaguered Comelec chief could have seen these “working girls” flaunting their wares along Naguillan Road sleazy night establishments starting from the oldest funeral parlor to the cemetery. There are also plenty of these along Legarda Road up to Marcos Highway, according to our bubwits.

It is in these areas where deals are reportedly struck between the ladies and customers who are held in magic spells when the ladies start undressing slowly around 11 p.m. up to the wee hours of the morning.
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They reportedly go there to relax, away from cruel or nagging wives. Paying for sex, they say, is just doing the shortcut to attain happiness, even for a while. Some guys argue the covenant between working girl and the customer is more honest: Neither party has to pretend it’s about anything other than sex. As one would say, you’re not paying them to have sleep with you -- you’re paying them to
leave.

Blame it on male ego but they say prostitutes have a crucial role in saving marriages – even if they are less than a day old – like those chicks they sell along Mabini. The jaded say nearly all men at one time or another have the urge to stray. Much better, they say, get a quick fix from a “working girl” than date the wife in expensive Camp John Hay.

Of course, they say, getting pleasure from such areas could leave one urinating painfully sticky fluid for at least three weeks but then …
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Practitioners say in an ideal marriage, the husband never strays. Their rationale: Who is perfect? The next best thing: a hubby who only hires hookers. After all, they say, what man would leave a wife for a commercial sex worker?

They say if human dignity is what worries moralists (or rather molarists), why single out prostitution? (These are the people who talk about dignity or mouth the word of God but enjoy the company of working women in Clark, Subic, Manila or yes – far Cebu.)

There are plenty of dead-end jobs with limited growth potential that are equally undignified – most of them done by men. These pay a lot worse than flesh peddling. Among the “molarists” there is something repugnant about a woman using sex as a commodity.
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But come to think of it, this is better than stealing huge, stinky money from government coffers or getting hefty kickbacks from contract projects. One could be sentenced to live the rest of one’s life in a mansion This is shameful and these Janus (the man with two faces) creatures should be consistent enough not to look at huge advertisements or magazine pictures of pretty women only wearing a bra or a panty.

After all, what are models if not women who have commodified their bodies? I guess, this is the reason why some countries have realized that needy women who have no recourse to feed themselves or their families have legalized prostitution like in Rome, the seat of Christianity.

The practitioners say in this modern computer age of consent, there is no reason why men should be stopped from buying them – or at least renting them out for an hour since some women also do rent out men. ***

Of course, we are just speculating and thinking aloud. But some men have admitted that their happiest sexual experiences have been with hookers. They say working women are more honest, straightforward and nonjudgmental, which is more than can be said for most “respectable” romantic partners.

Maybe, this issue could be discussed more openly in the future without worrying about public censure. After all, I guess, people are becoming more open about the matter. That television discussion on sex over ANC with Tina Monzon Palma and some doctors and a pretty, young and “wild” columnist who bared her sexual preferences and experiences up to having her G-spot injected with collagen was “educational.” But for the prudes, I guess the topic was blasphemy.

Days like these, the hangover works something strange on the head. See what a city hall tipster could do? God forbid any of our militant lady friends from Gabriela read this column. I wouldn’t want to be roasted and eaten alive.