Unassuming Contributions

This was our final day in the streets of Hanoi. Though the day itself wasn't too much to speak of, I felt it important to write of the one thing that happened today that has imprinted itself in our memories. Without realising it, today we unintentionally made a contribution (albeit somewhat minor) to Vietnam's sex tourism industry.

We'd planned to get massages this afternoon to counter the effects of sleeping in soft, lumpy hostel beds. I suggested we go to a massage place that I saw when we were having coffee in a small department store in the centre of Hanoi - one which was well-lit and advertised a range of beauty treatments. From the surrounds, I figured it was a legitimate operation...

.. While I was being cracked and pummeled, so too climbed upon (?), poor Simon was being propositioned in the next room. In the main, the woman had behaved perfectly naturally and professionally, until the last few minutes of the 'massage' where it became clear that the woman worked for 'tips'. Simon handled the situation very well and before we knew it, we were out the door.

We're both pretty shocked and affronted by the situation, more so because of the attitude of the women. Both with the curves of mothers, no less. It has been clear from the outset we were a couple, and in this situation, the women need not sell their bodies to us - but chose to regardless - and seemed shocked that we'd not reponded in kind.

It's not the perculiarity of it, no, I'm sure this kind of 'misunderstanding' happens all the time. Rather, it's the grit, the muck, the grime of a sex tourism industry of which we'd heard so much but seen so little...