What I Learned by Being a Migrant Sex Worker (Part 2): Parrenas

Oct. 14 (Bloomberg) -- I spent nine months in Tokyo workingas a hostess in a working-class club in one of the city’s manyred-light districts, frequented by members of the yakuza, theJapanese crime syndicates. This type of place, in a seedylocation, owned by a proprietor with a questionable background,was often assumed to be a site of forced prostitution.

In 2005 and 2006, I resorted to this work as a way ofgaining access to the world of Filipina hostesses in Japan.During my first three months in Tokyo, I had struggled to meethostesses willing to participate in my study of theirconditions. My visits to clubs as a customer had not providedany solid leads. Attending church with fellow Filipinas had notgained their trust. Even hostesses whom I befriended had alwaysdeclined my request for an interview. I had assumed that theyhad experienced emotional distress from the stigma associatedwith their occupation. I had come to Japan believing claims byother academics that “hostess work” was a euphemism for“prostitution.”