It’s July in Dubai. It’s 50 degrees Celsius and the hot air wraps around my body like blankets on fire. Sand blows in my face. Here, women wear long clothes and men roam around in slippers and shorts. Nobody wants to spend their summer here in July – rich residents have already fled to a cooler country. Without the glamour and liveliness that money brings, the city is laid bare. The naked truth about Dubai is that it is empty. It’s the kind of emptiness that one feels. Outside, tall skyscrapers try to hide the vast emptiness from view, but they are few and far between. The inside is no different. Even in clean, high-end luxury malls, something is amiss. The shoppers, few in number compared to the cooler months, are well-dressed but seem difficult to befriend. When interviewed, foreign workers from wealthier countries say that they are satisfied with their jobs, but want to relocate as soon as possible. Manual workers are, on the other hand, dissatisfied with their working conditions but want to stay because they’ve seen worse.
It’s been two weeks since I arrived. I’ve been hospitalized once for underestimating the heat. Now I’m more careful; I go outside only when I know I won’t faint. I walk to my favorite bubble tea café, just two minutes away from my hotel. Two minutes is more than enough for the heat to do its damage. The heat is vicious because it damages the mind, not just the body. By the time I arrive, I’ve lost whatever train of thought I had. The café waiters greet me like they always do. They’re friendly Southeast Asians who had asked me where I was from on my first day of arrival. Since then, they’ve been greeting me in Korean. At first I thought it was too much. Now I know this is the best welcome I can get here. Outside of this café, I feel seen and judged most of the time. I wear long-sleeved clothes but people stare at me – not only because I am foreign, but also because I don’t wear shame. Dubai isn’t a city where a woman walks with confidence.
Annyeonghaseyo – the waiters say in unison. They switch the music to K-pop. I never like being reminded of Korea in this way, but it’s cute. I order the cheapest bubble tea. I tell myself: today, I’m getting my work done. I’m here as a journalist but I haven’t interviewed any sex workers, the focus of my work. I’ve been picking up call-girl cards from the streets. So many scantily dressed young women. I choose a card with a picture of an Asian woman. I enter the WhatsApp number on a phone I borrowed from a friend as an undercover work device. I change my profile picture to an AI-generated man in his 30s.
I’m John now. I’m connected to a pimp that runs a massage parlor. I ask him for the girls’ prices. I find it too easy to talk as a creepy man, to talk as John himself. I ask about the girls’ nationalities and what services they can offer. I’m following the list of questions on my interview pad, but I no longer feel like a journalist. I’m John, wondering how I can get the best value for my money tonight. I feel powerful. The pimp keeps calling me Mr John. Mr John, just say what you want and all girls are available, all services are available. I ask if I get to the room directly so that I don’t have to see him. I get the details of the parlor.
***
It’s 10 pm, but the heat still makes me sweat. I’m standing in front of the small building that’s supposed to be Mr John’s massage shop. I’m nervous – I don’t want to scare my masseuse. I go over my interview guidelines. I won’t ask any sensitive questions. I won’t ask her name. It’ll be fine. I tell myself that it’s probably much better to expect a man and be met with a woman than vice versa. I go up a flight of stairs and find the second room to the right as instructed. It looks quite normal to me. I notice that there are metal bars glued to the ceiling, which are for professional Thai massages, according to an article I’d read beforehand. There are framed credentials hanging on the wall, proving that they provide real services. But I feel uneasy; where’s my suspicion coming from? It might be because of the lighting. It’s very reddish-orange – a color that I’ve seen so often in the red-light districts in Seoul.
My masseuse knocks and enters the room. She’s a Southeast Asian woman. She looks only slightly older than me. Hello – ah! She exclaims. Sir, so beautiful! I guess she was taught only the words she’d use, and she’d probably never need to call anyone miss. But why is she not surprised that I’m a woman? Change, sir? she asks, pointing at some disposable shorts on the bed. Oil massage, sixty minutes? I nod. She leaves. I’m thinking that her English isn’t good enough for some of my questions.
I undress and put the shorts on. There’s nothing to wear as a top so I’m naked except for the baggy shorts that can fall off my hips any second. I look in the mirror next to the bed. The red light makes me look even more naked than I actually am. My skin looks fair and glowy, and my stomach looks flat. The masseuse comes in again. So beautiful, sir! She keeps repeating herself. My grandmother also used to repeat herself like that. You, Korea? she asks. Yes, I’m from Korea. She doesn’t ask me what I’m doing here in Dubai at the most unpopular time of the year. My sister in Korea, she says, she work there. She oils her hands and beckons me to lie down on the bed. What’s your sister’s work in Korea? I ask. She doesn’t answer.
Where are you from? Thailand. How old is your sister? She puts up one finger and then nine – 19. I let my mind wonder what her sister could be doing in Korea. I think about the article I read earlier today. It said that the Korean government was secretly subsidizing old men in rural Korea to help them buy teenage wives from Southeast Asian countries. I don’t know why I’m thinking any of this. I don’t know why I assumed her sister was trafficked into Korea. She rolls up my shorts and starts pinching my legs. I have varicose veins, so they hurt a lot. I groan. Sorry, sir! So sorry! She keeps apologizing. It’s okay – it’s okay! She softens my calves. I want to go Korea, Korea is so good. I want to see my sister.
My sister and my mom are in Korea too, I tell her. I miss my sister. That was the word she was looking for. I miss my sister, I go Korea soon. Her hands feel firm now. I open my eyes and look at her face. I’m so happy for you! When are you going to Korea? Four… she begins to say. – Years? Months? Weeks? I interject. She doesn’t seem to know these words. She shrugs. Her hands roll down my arms and they feel nice.
The massage ends. I remember that I haven’t asked any of the questions I’d planned to ask. I don’t want to. Thank you so much, sir, she says, wiping her hands clean. She smiles and looks at me again. So beautiful. She leaves the room. I dry the oil off my body and turn the white lights on. I look in the mirror again, but under these lights, my skin isn’t as smooth as before. I see the blemishes on my face and the fat around my stomach and wonder if she’d still say I’m beautiful.
When I walk outside, it’s midnight, hotter and darker than before. Every night is rude like this in Dubai. The air wraps around my body again. I don’t remember how good the massage felt. I can only think of how I need to take a shower as soon as I get back to my hotel.
Jessie Hwang's Prose and Pictures 