We found the year-old through an online listing. She agrees to share her experiences, including the seamier side of the job, on the condition that we do not name her as she is still training to be an educator. Her deft fingers massage away knots in her clients' backs - something she learnt at a four-month course she attended three years ago. Sometimes I can tell from the way they look at me. She is candid about offering sexual services, but does not consider herself a prostitute.
Prostitution is legal in Singapore. I do not put a price tag on my body," she explains. At this reporter's shock at her confession, she says her clients want home-based services precisely for these extras.
Otherwise, they'd visit a spa, explains the soft-spoken woman, who has been married for about 18 years. She claims she needs the extra income to support her husband, who is schizophrenic. She also claims that he is aware of what she does but does not object to her making the extra income.
He is pretty co-operative," she says. The least? I had to save up to study, and I have to support my husband, who is sick," she says unabashedly. Clients typically make appointments with her via text messages or a phone call to a mobile number that she has registered specifically for business purposes.
The anecdotes she has collected over the past three years in the trade are nothing short of colourful. About 60 per cent of the 50 customers she has serviced are repeat clients, and some of them get so attached to her they ask to meet her every day for meals and dates.
