Business as usual in steamy Jozi

Strip clubs in Johannesburg tend to remind me of your average trendy restaurant: an overpriced menu and bad service.

The situation resembles the lyrics of a Goodie Mob song, an erstwhile stripper anthem in the group’s hometown, I’m told: ‘They don’t dance no more; all they do is sit around chilling.”

The crash-course moves, delivered in a jaded manner, say: ‘This is what you’ll be getting as soon as I touch the ground [head first]. Are you keen?”

Granted, these institutions are meant to get a whack of blood rushing straight to the head (the other one), and sustain this sensation until you cannot help but put out to bust out. The reality, however, is that it often translates into quite the opposite: anaesthesia of the senses. If there is one thing South Africa’s sex barons can improve on ahead of 2010, it’s the quality of the dancing.

Club Malasha, for example, situated in Randburg’s CBD and run by ‘Uncle Louis”, has been superbly upgraded since the move to its new premises in 2004, but I get the sense that dancing, a key aspect in Seduction 101, was an afterthought in his plans ahead of the sex spree that the 2010 World Cup is hyped up to be.

‘It takes two to three days and they get the hang of it because most women know how to dance anyway,” says Louis of the peer-driven dance training on offer at his venue.

Louis, who is currently in Durban scouting for new premises, as well as Indian girls, the latter to accommodate Randburg’s changing demographics, runs a rather pricey venue — a ‘private lap dance” can cost up to R500. While business is on the upswing, it is rather disheartening to see him take such a lax approach to a key component of his business.

Even in the newspaper classifieds, where sexual services are still packaged according to stereotypes, there is no telling whether the fantasy will add up in living colour.

Agnes (not her real name), who in one newspaper ad goes as a ‘black maid in stockings”, doesn’t quite fit the description she proffered in the preamble leading up to our meeting. Unprompted, over the phone, she rattled off a series of obviously rehearsed vital stats, including her stomach shape, complexion and the length of her pubes.

‘I don’t advertise myself like that anymore, you must have been looking at an old ad,” says an ageing figure in a leopard print bikini when I ask her about the uniform, which she informs me, worked according to plan.

‘Every man has the ambition to fuck their maid,” she says in hushed tones from her bedroom. ‘From growing up you learn a lot of things from them. So, when nature calls she’s there and she’s a woman. Even if men don’t actually do it, they fantasise about it. White men love black women, but they never have a chance of doing it [with them].”

Agnes says she does not live in fear of the law because she plies her trade in a lavish house in pricey Sandton. ‘Our job is not dangerous, like dealing drugs or whatever. A man will have a wife, but he’ll still come here, because he’s like a dog. It’s like if you put a nice clean bone on the floor for a dog to have, he’ll lick the bone. And if you throw the other one that is in your hands ahead of him, he’ll leave the one he has and run after the one that is far away. As long as people are doing the wrong thing the right way — you know what I mean? — like using condoms, then this business is not going anywhere.”

Agnes, who became nervous and abruptly halted my questions, said her plan for 2010 is to have a house of her own, with ‘four classy beautiful girls”. Of what race, I inquire? ‘Black girls, because they are the best. They are very warm. Most white people like black women because of their warm personality — sexually too.”

And if you thought South Africa was evolved enough to offer phone sex in 11 official languages, the truth is, for black men who prefer dirty talk in their mother tongues, what’s on offer for them are primary school-style instructions. Think a six-step plan on how to sharpen a pencil. By dialling a number advertised in a popular daily newspaper’s classifieds, punters can take instructions from a whimpering female voice on how to properly stimulate isibindi sesibumbu (‘the vagina’s liver”) and perform positions like the Sleeping Dog, which, as the instructor guarantees, will help you reach the elusive G-spot.

After sheepishly faking an orgasm, the voice bids you a condescending farewell with: ‘These are some styles you can try for this month. Niphane kamndandi [Give it to each other good].”