The oldest profession

By Sim Kwang Yang

The Chinese language Oriental Daily published an interview with a senior lady cop by the name of Noraini recently. I had heard of her reputation on the streets of Kuala Lumpur four years ago. She was known as the incorruptible iron-faced police woman who created havoc for the prostitution rings that used to thrive along the throbbing sin strips of the Golden Triangle.

In the interview, the lady cop recalled one of the most harrowing incidents in her career. She was conducting a raid against vice in a Bukit Bintang Hotel. To escape capture, a Chinese national climbed out of the window from her room on the 7th floor, slipped, and fell to her death below.

Betraying her human face beneath her police persona, this lady cop expressed her sadness. “This girl came to Malaysia from China, just to make some money. She lost her life simply because she did not have her passport with her. She would have gotten away with a small fine. Life can be so cheap.’

I remember the incident well. Walking along that inhospitable oppressive stretch and minding my own business, I had noticed a crowd milling around the vicinity of the hotel, including quite a few policemen. A bystander told me the story. A Chinese girl had fallen to her death near the hotel swimming pool, in her attempt to get away from certain arrest. I had thought to myself then, “Life can be so cheap!”

I actually know that area quite well, having lived there with all the other countless faceless transient residents for quite a few years.

Shadier realm

The city centre is an area and a way of life with which middle-class Malaysians living in the comfortable suburbs of Kuala Lumpur are not likely to be acquainted. Beneath the glamour of the bright lights of city life, behind the major thoroughfare marking out the shopping, hotel and, tourist belt, there is an underworld populated by the underclass and the shadier realm of Malaysian life.

Where tourists converge, of course there is ubiquitous prostitution. Every year, Kuala Lumpur plays host of something like 10 million tourists from all over the country and all over the world. Surely, out of the masses of visitors, some will have on their mind more than sight-seeing and shopping. Where there is a demand, there is a supply.

I am not talking about those back streets near Bukit Bintang and what is commonly called China Town. (Some of my Chinese friends find the name “China Town” revolting, and for good reasons too.) In those dark alleyways and back-lanes, ladies of allegedly ill repute ply their trade, using the dingy lodging houses and Chinese hotels as their base of operation, and entertaining a clientele made up of labourers and foreign workers. Their fees are miniscule.

I am referring instead to the high-powered flesh trade that entertains numerous occasional tourists itchy for a scratch and the travelling salesman with an expense account to burn. It is part of an alternative economy raking in perhaps billions of untaxed income every year.

If you are a single male not-so-old traveller just checked into a hotel, the bell boy who fusses around the room and lingers a little too long for a tip would likely pop the inevitable question: ”Do you desire female company Sir?” If you only ask, the taxi driver hovering at the hotel entrance would be more than happy to oblige.

The Becha man in Penang Street in Pulau Penang would serve the same purpose, except that failing to get a positive response from me, he offered boys instead! It seems universally assumed that male travellers seek sexual favours for a fee.

Certainly, even respectable hotels will have some sort of “health centre”, which may not always have your health in mind, and which can actually be harmful to it. The closure of a few such establishments in the Bukit Bintang area in weeks past has actually caught media attention.

Touting pimps

A short walk away, the streets are strewn with entertainment outlets offering the usual entertainment fare. In many of these places, female companionship is available for hire on an hourly or tips basis. They may bear the title of Guest Relation Officer. Not all of them are prostitutes, but for the clients, it is always a challenge to make a business proposal, negotiate a good deal, and close it.

When night falls on Jalan Bukit Bintang, and right up to day-break, this most famous street in Malaysia is stalked throughout its entire length by touting pimps of all descriptions, including quite a few women. If you walk that short distance between Sungei Wang Plaza and the Federal Hotel say, you are more than likely to be accosted by half a dozen of these shadowy characters.

Before you know it, one of these hungry-looking people would fall in step with you like a shadow, and in a rapid-fire of hard sell, reel off a menu of available ware for your selection, cheaper women from Indonesia, sometimes Thailand but if you wish for more exotic fare, there are ladies from China, or from some former Soviet state with the unpronounceable name. Prices are negotiable of course, and a little haggling is expected. They are a pain in the side, always.

These pimps and their girls are big players in an invisible illegal massive industry, as I was told by a person in the know. They are mostly drug addicts, and try to earn just enough commission for another fix, working for others who have actually taken charge of the supply. Occasionally, a police operation will sweep them off the streets for a few days. Then they will be back, mingling with the bona fide tourists, the thronging shoppers and the tourist police on the beat.

On the high end of the market though, the operation is much more complex and much more sophisticated. They use high-tech communication tools, and have a seemingly well-managed hierarchy of command system, with some degree of division of labour. The ladies are ferried all over the city by couriers driving an assortment of impressive cars right up to the doorstep of their clients. Without any tangible base of operation, they are hard to catch red-handed.

How bad is the problem really?

Here, I have to give the Malaysian police some credit where credit is due. The seedy massage parlours operating in the sleazy parts of the city are all but wiped out. The once notorious Jalan Alor and the Sun Complex are now relatively sanitised. The Hick’s Mansion is now emptied of that kind of clientele. The problem has become much less visible and blatant than say, two or three decades ago.

But honestly, you can never root out this the oldest profession on earth, not even if PAS comes to power and implements the fearsome Hudud Law… You can only contain it, merely.

The tourism dollars

At least the Malaysian government has the right approach in promoting tourism in Malaysia. We all know how desperately we need the foreign exchange earned from tourism each year. We also know how unfettered tourism of the wrong sort would exert the kind of negative impact on our physical and socio-cultural ecosystem.

Those who have travelled to the Mecca of sex tourism in neighbouring countries can bear testimony to the wisdom of promoting our sights, our food, and shopping over and above even the slightest hint of offering human flesh for the mighty Dollar. For one thing, it helps to stem the rising tide of Aids in the region.

As for the moral and legal issues entangled in this universal phenomenon, well, they are far more complex than most people realise perhaps. For one thing, any thematic explication of these issues involves inevitably the question of sex. As we all know, any discussion on sex – even one on the commoditisation and commercialisation of sex – is bound to draw a very strong response from everybody and ends up pleasing nobody. It is a landmine of taboos, superstitions, and prejudices.

Not long ago, a letter writer to the editor of the local Chinese press called for the legalisation of prostitution in Malaysia. The grounds he cited were mostly utilitarian, consequentialist and pragmatic, worthy of the author’s liberal humanist ideals with the interest of the sex workers at heart.

The response was as swift as it was merciless in the condemnation of just such an idea! To legalise prostitution, the rejoinder argues, is to condone the immorality of illicit sex. One may as well legalise drug abuse, gambling, abortion, and a whole host of crimes that are condemned by both social morality and the teaching of all religions.

We are very far from legalising prostitution yet. In fact, in Malaysia, we are far from a fruitful discussion on whether such legalisation is desirable. Somewhere in the discussion, the proper course of the discourse is bound to be side–tracked by some mavericks who make all sorts of unfounded claims passed off as rational argument. This is Malaysia, where citizens have yet to determine the rules of engagement in any debate.

Nevertheless, in private circles at least, there is a peevish but not altogether perverted interest in the subject of prostitution. Perhaps it is worth a second look.