By Erick Kabendera
From where I stood a mass of small mud-houses totally filled the space in front of me. Some faced each other crowding either side of the path ahead, while others stood directly on the path forcing it to meander around them in search of a way through the crush.
The majority of the inhabitants of the houses in this section of Dar es Salaam are sex workers and are predominantly Haya. At least that is what I gathered, as the majority of conversations and arguments I heard were conducted in Kihaya.
The women sat along the path dressed in provocative mini skirts and khangas, which flapped flimsily from side to side exposing their thighs, as much for sale as the pyramids of tomatoes or chunks of meat flogged by vendors in the area.
It was seven p.m. in the Uwanja wa Fisi area of Manzese and by that time, the whole street was in darkness because the entire area has no electricity. Still, the residents could easily be seen – from the short stools they were sitting on, each had placed a candle or a paraffin lamp down between their feet, perhaps for comfort, but more likely to ensure that they could better be seen.
Nobody, among the people I spoke to, knew exactly what the name Uwanja wa Fisi meant. Most said it was derived from the Kiswahili saying: “ Uwanja wa fisi Hapaanikwi ngozi” (You don’t spread your hide in hyena’s playground – because no man or woman is expected to be honest once he or she gets in there and is exposed to what goes on there). Let’s just say, the accepted abbreviated rough translation ‘Hyena’s ground,’ is very much in keeping with the murky desperation the area exudes.
The name Uwanja wa Fisi also seems to imply a very large neighbourhood, but about the size of two to three football pitches and with its meat vendors, pubs and small streets sheltering sex workers, it is in fact a small place which acts as a nerve centre for the whole Manzese ‘township’.
For outsiders, any perception of Uwanja wa Fisi will be based on a comparison with other parts of Dar es Salaam where life, although hard, is considered ‘decent.’ However harsh it may seem to visitors, the residents of Manzese Uwanja seem to be satisfied with the life they live. It’s what they are used to so for them it is normal.
In such an impoverished area, employment is obviously low, so people sell what they have… their bodies.
The sex industry runs day and night, the only difference being that during daytime the prostitutes selling their ‘wares’ don’t expose themselves outside as they do when darkness falls.
During the day customers simply enter the sex workers’ houses and negotiate from there, if they are not sitting outside. Regular customers usually frequent Uwanja wa fisi at that time and occasionally, depending on their reliability and frequent business, can receive service on credit.
As I went past each house, each woman made lurid gestures to attract my attention and convince me that they were the best of the lot.
One of them appeared well-dressed and sweet from where she was sitting. She said softly in Kiswahili: “Kaka karibu hapa, bei poa!” (Welcome brother, it is cheap here) and then politely explained her rates.
Conventional sex, she said, costs between Sh500 and Sh200, while anal intercourse is bumped up to Sh1,000. But, as she had her own room to host customers, any customer wanting privacy is supposed to pay Sh500 for the room. At night the cheaper alternative is to satisfy your carnal lust right there on the path.
I settled the bill up front and we entered her room.
It was tiny and sparse. For furniture, it had only a bed measuring about six feet and there were none of the utensils one would expect to see in other houses where women live. Two small children slept on woven dirty straw mats.
Their mother took a loose bed sheet from the bed and covered them and before I knew it, she stood naked before me.
Suddenly I was faced with the tricky task of explaining that my intention was actually not to have sex with her and that all I wanted was an interview.
She was not convinced.
“You’re the police and you want to arrest me?” she half-asked, half-accused me in fear.
“I will scream for help from my friends,” she warned me while clutching a packet of condoms in her left hand. Neither my promises to give her more money nor my politeness calmed her down, so I decided to leave her room.
Outside, her friends who had heard her accusatory screaming were standing around ready to confront me, but with a bit of explaining and negotiating, I managed to get out of there safely.
Around Uwanja wa Fisi’s narrow footpaths cheap women and cheap sex are round-the-clock fixtures as business begins from about ten a.m. right through to the following day. Most sex workers don’t stay out longer than ten p.m. because they fear hooligans attacking and raping them. Those who work over night are usually the ones who live in Uwanja wa fisi.
As I walked around on a Saturday at around eight p.m., I came across a girl standing along one of the paths with a male partner, busy sucking on each other’s faces.
The girl, Imaculata, 19, is a sex worker and her partner Peter is her boyfriend. Peter knows what his girlfriend does, though she does not like to talk about it. Briefly commenting on her situation, she said that her entire family is unemployed.
“He (Peter) stays with his parents and I stay with mine. We share equally whatever I get from the sex business from morning to evening,” she said.
Whenever Peter wants to have sex with her, like a client he just follows Imaculata along the dark paths where she works at night and they get on with it. “He can’t afford to pay for a room at a guesthouse like my customers and we cannot use the little money we get to pay for a room,” she said.
‘Guesthouse’ prices vary according to the level of accommodation. The most expensive guesthouses in the area cost Sh1,000 and the cheapest is rented out for Sh300 for no more than an hour and a half.
The more expensive guesthouses at Uwanja wa Fisi may be equipped with beds, dirty bed sheets and ruined mattresses. In most cases, the cheap ones have no beds and simply have a mattress on the floor – if you’re lucky. At the least, most have straw mats.
If Uwanja wa Fisi is said to be the reduced-price red light district of Dar es Salaam, then those prostitutes who operate in the Uwanja wa fisi pubs are said to be even cheaper than the rest and usually prefer beer as payment for their services. Often they are so far gone, that when they are seriously drunk, they have sex with more than two partners unconsciously.
At around 9.30 p.m., Uwanja wa Fisi becomes very busy with roast meat vendors and plenty of girls tooting for attention. Most of the women are all dressed up in their sexiest outfits but they move around aimlessly and look as if they have nowhere to go as they wait for something to happen.
Perhaps I’m sheltered, but the disregard and attitude of the men towards the women was astounding. They fondle women’s’ genitals in full view of everyone and neither children nor adults seemed shocked or even surprised at such lewd behaviour.
John Udugu, 78, lives in Uwanja wa Fisi. He joined a group of youngsters enjoying chunks of strange roasted meat sold for only Sh50 to Sh100. ‘Strange,’ because the meat which didn’t resemble any kind of meat that I could recognise – it seemed black in colour and some of that which sat uncooked under one of the tables didn’t smell right. Nobody, even the vendors, could say where it came from or what kind of animal it was.
All of Udugu’s six daughters are prostitutes – he knows that much – and between them they have more than eight children who live in Udugu’s house. In keeping with the generally cagey response I received from other people in Uwanja wa Fisi, Udugu didn’t reveal much about his life, but he appeared to be enjoying himself as he held aloft a cup of chibuku and a piece of roast meat.
“This is our life. We’ve nothing else, so leave us alone,” he told me.
Sunday seemed more peaceful compared to the other days when I visited Uwanja wa Fisi. I met Nancy, 20, who, as usual had positioned herself along one of the paths, eagerly awaiting customers. She had left her three-year-old son and her mother at home. As usual, they would wait all day for her to return with enough money for an evening meal.
Nancy’s father died ten years ago, leaving her in the hands of a helpless mother.
“The work is inhuman but I’ve nothing to do,” she said with her head bowed downwards. “If business is good, I take home maybe Sh6,000 per day. I know if I don’t do this job, my mother and son would starve.”
Nancy revealed that apart from the degrading nature of her job and the obvious health risks, the business is fraught with other dangers. Often, cheating customers refuse to pay their bills after sex, which forces the sex workers to pay older boys to come to their rescue when such situations arise.
And in keeping with prostitution the world over, drug abuse is common – whether to cope with their desperate existence or numb their days – and most girls smoke marijuana or use cocaine. Those who want to make money, other than the pittance they earn from selling their flesh, opt to become drug dealers.
Nancy agreed to talk to me as long as certain conditions were met. Her name had to remain anonymous, I had to double her bill, buy her a packet of cigarettes, pay for the room where we would go and talk and of course prove to her that I did not have a concealed tape recorder.
Business seemed quiet to me, but Nancy was pleased with her earnings saying she had made good money and was expecting more than other days.
She said most of her clientele are poor people themselves, though a few first-class punters visit occasionally. “Some of them are permanent customers and we have a timetable for when they come.”
Explaining why people looking to satisfy their carnal cravings come to Uwanja wa Fisi, Nancy said, “It is very cheap here compared to other parts of town. On top of that, it’s a good hideout for people who don’t want to be seen buying sex. Tanzanians think it Uwanja wa Fisi is a nasty place where most respected or otherwise decent people in the public eye wouldn’t come. But some of our customers take advantage of precisely that assumption.”
Mwanjobe and her non-Haya colleagues face stiff competition from the large contingent of Haya women in the area. She said because Haya women live permanently in Uwanja wa Fisi, they are in a position to get more customers than the rest. “Their landlords prefer them to us for some unknown reasons.”
Mwanjobe’s companion, Ashura arrived a month ago from Mwanza and her sister, a retired sex worker, immediately forced her into the business. Ashura now surrenders all the money she makes to her sister.
She told me that she had lost her virginity just a few days prior, but said she had recovered and was slowly getting used to the situation. “Now, I don’t feel as much pain compared to ten days ago, but some men are very brutal. They pay for normal sex but force you into both conventional and anal sex.”
There is nothing for Ashura back in Mwanza, as both her parents are dead. She has nobody to depend on except her sister whom she lives with.
At ten p.m. that day, two lads came running towards where I stood, stopped right in front of me and started fighting, trying to pull me into their play-fight. It was a childish street-trick because I knew they wanted to rob me and I soon moved away.
In a place as packed yet as desperately desolate as Uwanja wa Fisi, it seemed appropriate to stop by the aptly named ‘No Name Pub.’ That was earlier on Saturday and by then all the drinkers were drunk and seemed to have been there for quite sometime.
Visiting customers who frequent this hyena hell-hole ‘hunting’ cheap women are betrayed by their appearances. I was no exception in my black jeans, brown T-shirt and sneakers, despite my efforts and weeklong preparations to look like the locals.
The drinkers noticed this and the mood soon turned hostile. A man in torn overalls who seemed solemnly drunk stood up at my arrival and declared loudly: “We’ve a boss here today.” Another who sat by his side took over the conversation: “A boss or a police officer looking for illicit brew?” he asked.
My options were to leave as soon as possible or buy them a drink to clear their doubt. There was a variety of local brews; Chibuku, Chakacha and Gongo la Mavi (a brew made out of human faeces and other ingredients, which a man who sat next to me told me quite proudly, was only sold to frequent customers like him.)
The drinkers’ appearance was very rough, with bare feet, long uncombed hair, and motley patched clothing. Loud music blared from an old medium size amplifier and the speakers were placed on top of large pots to produce a louder sound as the drinkers mimed along. The pub had no chairs, just rough benches and dirty mats to match the drinkers.
Each male drinker ordered a big cup of the brew of his choice. They formed a circle, put all cups in the middle and then passed the cups to each other, sipping from the cup in turn, until the brew was finished.
Soon after the cups were emptied, a fight broke out between two men over a woman and the situation soon turned chaotic as other drinkers intervened, all trying to either help their friends or stop the fight. At nine p.m., the pub’s management played a recorded seven p.m. news bulletin to fool the drinkers into thinking that it was still too early for them to go home. The end result is that they stay and divide their money between more drinking and more unsafe sex.
A non-governmental organisation, Kiwohede, has set up a voluntary testing and counselling centre in Uwanja wa Fisi to increase Aids awareness among residents. According to Idd Ngunde, the chairman of the Tandale local government where Uwanja wa Fisi is located, through an International Labour Organisation (ILO) sponsored project, several sex workers were recruited and given entrepreneurship skills.
“The training is given in phases and the first phase involved eight sex workers who promised us they would quit the sex business,” Ngunde said.
Most of trainees who joined the first phase of the programme felt they couldn’t keep their promise of quitting prostitution and requested to be moved from Uwanja wa Fisi and permanently rehabilitated.
Ngunde confirmed the presence of many Haya women at Uwanja wa Fisi. “It’s true that many who are living in those houses are Haya by tribe and an association, Umoja Pakacha Muungano, Upamu, is giving them soft loans for starting business,” he said.
A security group has also been started in the area to try and maintain peace and order and as a result the crime rate has reportedly declined. But Ngunde added that most people who visit or operate in Uwanja wa Fisi come from other neighbouring wards and districts.
On my way to interview Ngunde, I bumped into Ashura again, but she pretended to have forgotten me. She reluctantly stopped when I called her. “What do you want?” she asked. I reminded her where we had met three nights ago. She overreacted: “You’re insulting me. Be careful about what you say next time,” she said.
A petty trader who was nearby and had overheard the exchange, said that if I had told her that we met worlds away at the Moevenpick Hotel, she probably would have agreed to see me and talk to me.
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