Older white women join Kenya's sex tourists

[Mid]

FEATURE-Older white women join Kenya's sex tourists
26 Nov 2007 08:04:35 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Jeremy Clarke

MOMBASA, Kenya, Nov 26 (Reuters) - Bethan, 56, lives in southern England on the same street as best friend Allie, 64.

They are on their first holiday to Kenya, a country they say is "just full of big young boys who like us older girls".

Hard figures are difficult to come by, but local people on the coast estimate that as many as one in five single women visiting from rich countries are in search of sex.

Allie and Bethan -- who both declined to give their full names -- said they planned to spend a whole month touring Kenya's palm-fringed beaches. They would do well to avoid the country's tourism officials.

"It's not evil," said Jake Grieves-Cook, chairman of the Kenya Tourist Board, when asked about the practise of older rich women travelling for sex with young Kenyan men.

"But it's certainly something we frown upon."

Also, the health risks are stark in a country with an AIDS prevalence of 6.9 percent. Although condom use can only be guessed at, Julia Davidson, an academic at Nottingham University who writes on sex tourism, said that in the course of her research she had met women who shunned condoms -- finding them too "businesslike" for their exotic fantasies.

The white beaches of the Indian Ocean coast stretched before the friends as they both walked arm-in-arm with young African men, Allie resting her white haired-head on the shoulder of her companion, a six-foot-four 23-year-old from the Maasai tribe.

He wore new sunglasses he said were a gift from her.

"We both get something we want -- where's the negative?" Allie asked in a bar later, nursing a strong, golden cocktail.

She was still wearing her bikini top, having just pulled on a pair of jeans and a necklace of traditional African beads.

Bethan sipped the same local drink: a powerful mix of honey, fresh limes and vodka known locally as "Dawa", or "medicine".

She kept one eye on her date -- a 20-year-old playing pool, a red bandana tying back dreadlocks and new-looking sports shoes on his feet.

He looked up and came to join her at the table, kissing her, then collecting more coins for the pool game.


"JUST UNWHOLESOME"

Grieves-Cook and many hotel managers say they are doing all they can to discourage the practice of older women picking up local boys, arguing it is far from the type of tourism they want to encourage in the east African nation.

"The head of a local hoteliers' association told me they have begun taking measures -- like refusing guests who want to change from a single to a double room," Grieves-Cook said.

"It's about trying to make those guests feel as uncomfortable as possible ... But it's a fine line. We are 100 percent against anything illegal, such as prostitution. But it's different with something like this -- it's just unwholesome."

These same beaches have long been notorious for attracting another type of sex tourists -- those who abuse children.

As many as 15,000 girls in four coastal districts -- about a third of all 12-18 year-olds girls there -- are involved in casual sex for cash, a joint study by Kenya's government and U.N. children's charity UNICEF reported late last year.

Up to 3,000 more girls and boys are in full-time sex work, it said, some paid for the "most horrific and abnormal acts".


"PREYING ON POVERTY?"

Emerging alongside this black market trade -- and obvious in the bars and on the sand once the sun goes down -- are thousands of elderly white women hoping for romantic, and legal, encounters with much younger Kenyan men.

They go dining at fine restaurants, then dancing, and back to expensive hotel rooms overlooking the coast.

"One type of sex tourist attracted the other," said one manager at a shorefront bar on Mombasa's Bamburi beach.

"Old white guys have always come for the younger girls and boys, preying on their poverty ... But these old women followed ... they never push the legal age limits, they seem happy just doing what is sneered at in their countries."

Experts say some thrive on the social status and financial power that comes from taking much poorer, younger lovers.

"This is what is sold to tourists by tourism companies -- a kind of return to a colonial past, where white women are served, serviced, and pampered by black minions," said Nottinghan University's Davidson.


"LIVE LIKE THE RICH"

Many of the visitors are on the lookout for men like Joseph.

Flashing a dazzling smile and built like an Olympic basketball star, the 22-year-old said he has slept with more than 100 white women, most of them 30 years his senior.

"When I go into the clubs, those are the only women I look for now," he told Reuters. "I get to live like the rich mzungus (white people) who come here from rich countries, staying in the best hotels and just having my fun."

At one club, a group of about 25 dancing men -- most of them Joseph look-alikes -- edge closer and closer to a crowd of more than a dozen white women, all in their autumn years.

"It's not love, obviously. I didn't come here looking for a husband," Bethan said over a pounding beat from the speakers.

"It's a social arrangement. I buy him a nice shirt and we go out for dinner. For as long as he stays with me he doesn't pay for anything, and I get what I want -- a good time. How is that different from a man buying a young girl dinner?"

(Editing by Daniel Wallis and Sara Ledwith)
alertnet.org

[Tchiowa]

Guess not a whole lot different than what goes on in SE Asia.

Old white bitchez get slammed by some buck mandingo with a roll of tar paper for a penis.

[Sir Burr]

Funny, I was in Mombasa a couple of weeks ago.
Back in 1980 when I was back-packing through Africa, there were many older, single white women going to the Sudan to get fucked by a tribe called the Dinka, who are known for the size of their JTs. So, it's nothing new, been going on a long time.
The Caribbean Islands have long been a destination for older white women to get laid.

[gonelive]

They get Sambo, we get Noi
fair and square

[Mr Earl]

^and don't forget Lek, Aoy, Dang, Nang, Pik, Tik, Tak, Porn, Sorn. Mot and Mat. Puy Louie and Jai.

[gonelive]

^and don't forget Lek, Aoy, Dang, Nang, Pik, Tik, Tak, Porn, Sorn. Mot and Mat. Puy Louie and Jai.

and Lada, Mook, Pee, Poo, Ning, Rat lets not forget Rat, Chutima

yes all the white ladies can have all the brothers they want, more than welcome to them all

[sabang]

The Gambia is meant to be an emerging hot spot for female sex tourism- unlike most of Africa, it is relatively safe too. A mate of mine is developing a hotel there to cash in.

Hell, women have got as much right to pay for sex as men. Maybe they'll stop whinging about the worlds oldest profession now.

[Silent Orchestra]

Slags

[chinthee]

These have got to be mostly English women as all the men have gone off to Thailand.

[sabang]

^ Your lot go to Fla (quite a lot of English gigolo's doing very well down there) and the Caribbean, and parts of Mexico. So far anyway.

Make no bones about it- female sex tourism is a growth market. Much more attractive investment opportunities than male sex tourism.

[chinthee]

^ Yes, you're right and LA also has a burgeoning gigolo business. Thailand also has quite a bit in the form of "dancing clubs" where older Thai married women frequent, supposedly in retaliation for their Thai husbands taking a Mia Noi.

Who knows? Who cares?

[sabang]

Not me. HK also has a gigolo scene, but very upmarket.

[November Rain]

Guess not a whole lot different than what goes on in SE Asia.

Old white bitchez get slammed by some buck mandingo with a roll of tar paper for a penis.

You mean sweaty wrinkly old men who need to pop the blue pills to get it up getting off with girls young enough to be their grandaughters?

No, you're right. It's not a whole lot different at all. Not sure how the second part of your statement comes into it (re SE Asia) though...

[sabang]

User pays, provider collects. Thats showbiz.

[November Rain]

^ Absolutely.

[Tchiowa]

You mean sweaty wrinkly old men who need to pop the blue pills to get it up getting off with girls young enough to be their grandaughters?

Have you been intimate with Boon Mee?

[Jet Gorgon]

^ Uh oh, I see a swift kick in the rear in your future, Tchi. 555555555555

I saw quite a few interesting couples in Thailand. But some of the Thai men are as sneaky as their female counterparts. But, the men often slagged off their older GFs besides taking their cash and often their pride.

In Japan, the women go to "tennis clubs", where they are afforded every luxury.

[Hootad Binky]

They get Sambo, we get Noi
fair and square

But don't expect any breathless documentaries about the terrible exploitative female sex tourists.

[raycarey]

But don't expect any breathless documentaries about the terrible exploitative female sex tourists.

are you condoning male sex tourism in asia? don't you consider it to be terrible and exploitative?

[Mr Earl]

But don't expect any breathless documentaries about the terrible exploitative female sex tourists.

are you condoning male sex tourism in asia? don't you consider it to be terrible and exploitative?

I agree the male sex tourist is horribly exploited here in SEA.

[sabang]

Prostitution both directly and indirectly pumps a lot of money into this economy, a good deal of which flows through to where it is most needed- the poorer parts of the country.

It feeds, clothes, houses and educates a lot of people who have nothing to do with the sex trade.

If you want to embark on some sanctimonious crusade against the evils of prostitution, thats up to you ray. But your efforts would be much better spent if you were to focus on the unsavoury elements, such as child prostitution and human trafficking.

[Texpat]

So in 20 years the population of London will be largely a Thai-African mix?
Wonder how they'll get on with the Pakis?

[sabang]

London seems to me to be mainly an Afro Caribbean, Indian and Caucasian mix. May as well throw in some more Asiatic for balance.

[patsycat]

I was on holiday in Mombassa last January and in January of 2006 and did see quite a few of these women with their very young Masai warrior suitors all decked out in their robes complete with spears. I was with my elderly mother, brother and sister. I must admit we did have a giggle, especially when the young men would be chatting away in Swahili on their mobile phones.

Not unlike the young ladies in Thailand

[Marmite the Dog]

Hard figures are difficult to come by, but local people on the coast estimate that as many as one in five single women visiting from rich countries are in search of sex.

Good on them.

These same beaches have long been notorious for attracting another type of sex tourists -- those who abuse children.

Not good. This is what needs focusing on.

"This is what is sold to tourists by tourism companies -- a kind of return to a colonial past, where white women are served, serviced, and pampered by black minions," said Nottinghan University's Davidson.

Cock!