4

You Can't Just Start Selling Your Body

Zhang Han

You may think that starting work as a prostitute is as easy as dressing sexily and actually accepting those lewd offers the guys are yelling at you anyway. But without a "caller," you'll be lost. Callers are basically those guys who twirl around big arrow signs to get people into mattress stores and pizza joints, but for sex workers. No, they don't dance on the street corners while spinning vagina-shaped signs -- they call out to passing tourists and carefully screen prospective clients. Each one knows what the prostitutes they represent can handle.

Zhang Han Figuratively and literally.

For example: They'll avoid pairing most of us with heavyset people. Many Vietnamese women are small, so a large, heavy man will be a problem. If the client persists and asks for us specifically, they will have to meet us for dinner rather than riding with us straight to the destination. That's not because we hate them -- fat tourists on mopeds are more of a physics problem than a moral one.

xuanhuongho/iStock Editorial/Getty Images "It's a motorbike, not a Walmart scooter."

The established callers all have their own turf, and they'll chase away any unrepresented prostitute they see working their area. Other areas are absolutely filled with moped-straddling hookers already, and thus the market is as saturated as ...

3

We Truly Care About The Customer Experience

Tuoi Tre

Prostitution sounds like a pretty straightforward business:

1. Direct "tab a" into "slot b."
2. Collect money.

cyclonebill/Wikimedia Slot c costs extra.

But, at least in my city, a surprising amount of thought goes into pairing each customer with the best prostitute for his wants and needs. We're a service industry, and just because we're literally servicing our customers doesn't mean we phone it in.

Say the client gets waved over to a caller. It's not like a taxi stand, where you hop into the first available opening. The caller and the client speak for a while first. Sometimes clients have specific wants -- anything from a classy escort experience to hardcore BDSM. Then their preference is divided into age, figure, sex, and ethnicity. It's like building your own video game character, only you get to fuck it once you're done.

Ethan Miller/Getty Images News/Getty Images It'll be at least four years before you can legitimately fuck your video game character.

After the caller finds out exactly what the client wants, only then does he contact the most fitting available prostitute. For longer negotiations, the caller might even stop at a drink stand and treat the client to some booze. The customer gets their free drunk on, while the street caller talks it over with the girls until a decision is reached upon who, exactly, is the best prostitute for the job at hand.

2

The Rivalry With Massage Parlors Can Get Ugly

Christian Nasca/iStock/Getty Images

Many massage parlors here are fronts for sex. There's no dinner, no conversation or getting to know each other a little first -- just straight to the "show." That's why the more traditional prostitutes in Saigon see massage girls as whores. (Ed. Note: If you're confused by that distinction, join the club.) Of course, I'm sure the massage girls think we're whores because we don't even throw a friendly massage in first.

Aleksan Gudenko/iStock/Getty Images "It's not all about the sex, dammit! What about the trapezius? Won't anyone think of the trapezius?"

When the caller for a moped prostitute and a pamphlet girl for a massage parlor get too close, things can explode. And not in a sexy, euphemistic way. Callers will knock the pamphlets out of the girls' hands; the girls will kick over the bikes of a rival. There's a parlor very near my room, and full-on fights over clients aren't at all uncommon. It's like a parody porno of The Warriors out there.

You don't want to know what the prostitute version of Luther sticks to her fingers.

1

The Police Actually Protect The Prostitutes

Paula Bronstein/Getty Images News/Getty Images