Why Do It?

Drug abuse has also fuelled sex tourism, because it’s an easy way to get money for a fix

“Sex work is work,” Dorothie says, breaking it down for my benefit into outdoors, indoors, brothels and home-based sex work (where a moneyed sex worker drives to a rendezvous in her own car to meet a client). “And it’s becoming more and more common because these girls get rich and now they’re taking it to the next level.”

But don’t think the industry is limited to tourists.  In a mnazi (coconut brew) den, the moonshine seller may have sex to boost her income. The business happens even in broad daylight and in public places. At a cafe in a popular area in Nyali where we’re chatting, around noon, Dorothie tells me that the place is also a sex tourism haunt, but that it’s mostly just the locals and local Wazungu who know this. When a woman orders a Fanta Orange soft drink, it’s a code that she’s open to a proposition; she’s fishing for clients.

“I used to work in a cafe, but to make ends meet, I was also a sex worker. Women do it for different reasons – some do it for the money and then there are others who just enjoy having sex,” Dorothy concludes.

“Sexual healing on the Kenyan Coast” continued tomorrow!

Originally published by Destination Magazine by Josaya Wasonga

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