great works in literature II 2850 kta 2:55-4:35— Shades of Truth . . .

The red light district in Havanna, Cuba is a special one. There isn’t just a specific part one the city that is the red light district, the whole city is the red light district. The reason why the whole city is like this is because of an economic collapse which forced thousand of both adolescent men and women to enter the world of prostitution. It is now known to be a sex-spot for tourist. Interestingly enough, even though there is so much sexual activity going on, they are very protected. What I mean by this is that they have less than 0.1% of the population that is infected with either HIV/AIDS or other STDs. One main component that keeps these numbers so low is the free health clinics around the city. The early detection of STD helps prevent it. They also they teach their children from a young age to stay protected, such as using condoms. It can be said that prostitution plays a big part in Havanna’s economy.

-Denny Huang

The red light district called Sonagachi, which is located in Kolkata which is also known as West Bengal, India. West Bengal has been given the nickname of ‘joy’ because of its beauty and the beautiful women that occupy it. The nature of this floating world is seen as hard working and dangerous. There are about 800-1000 women working a night in Sonagachi. Many of these women have been forced into their jobs by sex trafficking. However, some women choice this lifestyle because of the higher wages they receive. Many women will work these long and hard hours every night in order to save up enough money to have their kids prosper and live a better life. Society does not particularly agree with these women’s professions especially in consecutive India. With this being said, sex for money is not illegal in india, however solidifying customers is. Therefore, these women’s jobs come with a lot of risks. Many men that go to Sonagachi are criminals. These women face violence, rape, extortion, and robberies too often. They are hoping that soon India will see that legalizing this would be very positive to society. There would be a better understanding of AID’s and other STD’s, enforcement of contraceptives, and there would be less violence.

-Kelly Kay

Bangkok contains lots of red light districts, so much that just one search regarding its red light districts gives results of guides, hotels with special services, and thousands of related pictures immediately. In order to sustain such a large market, a massive labor force comprised of prostitutes must be available and presents in shops at all times. Although by law, prostitution is illegal in Thailand, the profession is very much tolerated in the country since it goes a long way back in the history of Thailand. However, aside from women who voluntarily threw themselves into the profession, another source of the massive labor force is through kidnapping of young women and even children. For women that have been divorced or in desperate need of money, the industry has proven to be a profitable source for them. As for those young women who was forced into the industry, it has been said that the owners of the bars and hotels keep them inside at all times and they were not allowed to leave the place.

-Chi Z.

In Bangkok the sex industry has been thriving since the 1960s. In this industry there are men that also work as prostitutes, but the workers are predominantly women. It is said that many of the workers in Bangkok’s red light district are there by their own free will and are usually there due to financial troubles at home. Most women are from extremely poor, large families with rural background and in order to provide for everyone the sex industry pays more money then the jobs that are actually available. There is an options for them to work under a ‘pimp’ or they can even work as free-lancers.
Women usually get into the industry in their teenage years because they believe they are ‘worth’ a higher value when they are still young. Once they get older, many women leave the industry while others stay as supervisors to new young workers. Many others are sent less tourist filled areas.
-Myra Khan

When doing research regarding the red light district of Thailand, I focused on the issue of human trafficking. When reading Cori Wittman’s thesis called “FROM RICE FIELDS TO RED LIGHT DISTRICTS: AN ECONOMIC EXAMINATION OF FACTORS MOTIVATING EMPLOYMENT IN THAILAND’S SEX INDUSTRY”, I discovered that the sex industry in Thailand is highly accepted and brings a high source of income to the economy of the country. On Wittman’s thesis, he describes four levels of entrance into the industry in a spectrum regarding human trafficking according to The Global Alliance Against Traffic. The first level being pure coercion and the last being completely voluntary. While reading, I learned that this social norm of accepting prostitution, comes from pressure the Buddhist religion puts on women to be the provider of the household. There were cases where young girls and women did not know that their family was sending them to work in these situations, which was pure coercion. Then there were other minor cases, still being that the young woman did not fully know what she was getting herself into, where friends told them about these jobs without full disclosure. Then there was the last spectrum where the woman knew exactly what it was and she had the monetary pressure to provide for her family.

-Diana Rodriguez

In almost every state of our country, legal prostituion is part of our distant and somewhat regretable past. Other than the state of Neveda, where there are still 8 active brothels, prostitution is a crime and is punishable up to a minimum of 6 months in jail. However, our desperate and maybe impulsive sexual behaviors have kept this massive and illegal market alive, grossing about 14.6 billi0n dollars annualy.

In NYC, there arnt any active brothels but there are number of “massage parlors” and strip clubs where illegal sexual conduct takes place for a pretty penny.  Customers call knowing that their appointments can go far beyond a massage if they are willing to pay the price. Most of the women wokring in these massage parlors are Korean immigrants who are looking to make money to support themselves. Apparently, these Korean girls can make up to 1,000 dollars a day on average. However, Korean immigrants are not the only demographic that partake in illegal prostituon.

NYC’s redlight district was designated by a Wall Street trader named Chris Arnade. Arnade drove past Hunts Point in the Bronx where he saw multiple women working the streets, looking to get picked up by any willing customer. On any given night you can see these women waiting on the streets, looking to do whatever it takes for some money.

Red light districts are may frowned upon by societies where they are uncommon, unlawful or inexistent. However, in popular cities like Tokyo, the “floating world” is a norm. The red light district in Tokyo is located in the city of Shinjuku. The district was name Kabukicho, after a theatre that was supposed to built, but financial distress from WWII ceased all plans of construction. Shinjuku was first known as Tsunohazu, and looked nothing like it does today; it use to be a swamp. After the war, the city recovered quickly with eager speculators and entrepreneurs who believed that the modernization of the town will deem profitable. The business which started it all was a Cabaret. As time progressed, the city became much more economically stable; this resulted in the start of businesses that are there today, and which categorizes Kabukicho as a red light district. such as three thousand bars, nightclubs, love hotels, massage parlours, hostess clubs. Tokyo, is a grand city like that of New York. Night life in a city is important, being that it brings in many tourists, wealthy persons, and even residents. Although, red light districts may seem unorthodox and morally wrong, it produces much profit, and helps the country’s GDP as a whole.

Ihara Saikaku, from Life of a Sensuous Woman: The narrator’s various and often contradictory relationships with men compels Saikaku to present several kinds of ambiguity.

Many of you point out the ambiguity of her “profession;” sometimes it seems like clear prostitution, as some of you noted with the priest (although Zeyu points out that the narrator is, literally, the priest’s “temporary wife,” and that she actually experiences a kind of true marriage with him). At other times, as many of you noted, the narrator doesn’t seem to be a prostitute in the traditional sense. When it is not exactly prostitution, or at least when she seems to be happy about what she’s doing, often there is another ambiguity, between sexual pleasure and “love.” Questions: Does the narrator know the difference between love and lust? Is the narrator “emotionally involved”? (Kelly’s term)

Contrarily, other comments point to the narrator’s indifference and detachment in what she is doing, that she is simply an opportunist. Question: if you feel this way, could she have revised her lifestyle to lead a more fulfilling life, even as a prostitute?

There is an interesting comment that the narrator is actually the aggressive party in most relationships, and this is quite an interesting observation. Question for everyone: Is the narrator actually a victim? Another comment suggests that the narrator turns a negative situation in a positive one. Is she simply making the best out of a situation, or is she a manipulator (as other comments suggested)?

Others point out the narrator’s (some of you don’t think it’s sincere) guilt at the end of the last tale. Questions that arise here are: Is her guilt indeed sincere? Is this really the first time she regretted her life? If you do feel your regret is sincere, is she regretting her prostitution? Her enjoyment, at times, of her career? Of her never actually having found love (or did she?)?

Ultimately, did the narrator have a fulfilling life? Does she seem mostly happy or unhappy?

It was interesting to witness how the old woman’s attitude towards her promiscuous lifestyle evolved as her story progressed. One view she shared of her experience that was particularly striking to me was when the old priest took her into his asylum and built a secret prison to keep her hidden away from the outside world. As the narrator recalled the event, he “Forced me down into this underground cell.” Secluded, gloomy, and minuscule; clearly these weren’t the best conditions for her to live in, and as time went by she progressively grew depressed. Unconsciously, she developed a clever coping mechanism to deal with this predicament,  something similar to what today is known as stockholm syndrome. She had to convince herself to actually like this pathetic old priest that was just using her for his sexual pleasures and enjoy being in his presence. “I found myself waiting up late, wishing he would come back.” This is a psychological defence mechanism that the body uses as a survival instinct; in order to survive her situation she had to adapt to it. The narrator’s mindset at this point is that she is doing whatever she has to to get by, and she might as well try to enjoy herself. After all, what is the point of living if life’s only full of misery?

-Borys

Although many may view the woman’s perspective on relationships with men as promiscuous, I found it to be very unique and introspective. She refused to feel jealous, claiming that “jealousy is something you must never, never give into.” The older woman, who has never been married, viewed men and women alike as not others’ possessions, but free spirits. Therefore, jealousy did not make much sense to her. She has fallen in love with so many men, that it became easy for her to leave and quickly become interested in another. She believes that without a passionate love, being with someone has the ability to physically kill you. After making love with a man who was initially full of desire but disrespected her, she predicted that he would not live very long. She thought, “you said some pretty disrespectful things just now. You won’t last even one year.” She was right; without a mutually passionate love, the man did not live much longer. As Borys mentioned, the older woman has had to sleep with many men in order to get by, and she quickly realized that nothing lasts forever and she would have to make the best of her situation. Life has never allowed her to feel that she is fully entitled to one man, and she has managed to apply that notion to all of the men that she has been with. I believe that it has made her immune to any feelings of jealousy or hurt over the ones she loved.

-Zuzanna

Saikaku, in “’Life of a Sensuous Woman”, discusses many different professions the narrator was forced into. The narrator deals with various relationships with various men. One relationship the narrator deals with was when a priest had fallen in love with her. “Eventually the head priest of one temple fell in love with me, and I agreed to become his temporary wife for three years in exchange for twenty-five pounds of silver” (pg. 600). The narrator agreed to become the priests’ wife in exchange for a payment. This, is clear prostitution. During this marriage, the priest would cheat on the narrator, and the narrator was aware of this. “And the head priest would bring his secret wife of the moment right into the monks’ quarters” (pg. 601). The narrator was depressed and unhappy during her relationship with this priest. “Living like this was depressing enough, but sleeping with the priest made me even sadder” (pg. 601) quoted the narrator. This was one of the many disastrous relationships the narrator had experienced.

-William Dayan

In the story, the narrator deals with her many men in different ways. One of the first stories she tells is of a lord. The narrator tells this story almost like it was just a simple job, of getting hired to work for a lord, however there were clear signs to believe that she was sold as a sort of prostitute to the lord to keep him sexually happy. She describes the experience of being working for a lord very luxurious and also dreamlike, as she couldn’t imagine there being anything else she wanted. “I’ve always been an unlucky woman, but with the lord I was fortunate. He was tender to me, and we enjoyed our lovemaking” (559). It is clearly seen here that being one of the lord’s women almost gave her a more positive outlook in life, as she felt lucky to be with him. It also seems to be that she starts to fall in love with him despite the fact that she is just there for sexual purposes. It is more clearly proven that she develops feelings for the lord when he begins taking herbal pills that make him weak and haggard. The councillors decide it is at fault of the narrator, and sends her back home to her parents, which is something she does not agree with. “These old me didn’t know the first thing about love, but they made the decisions” (599). We can see that the narrator did believe what she had with the lord was love, but it was taken away from her. The narrator seems to turn simply being hired as a woman for the lord to use into sharing a love with the lord, which shows how she can use love to deal with this specific situation.

-Sabera Qazi

At the end of the story, the narrator comes full circle, showing how she dealt with her profession that can be considered prostitution, by creating feelings of love for each and every man she came across. However, the narrator was left with a huge sense of guilt, as she describes recognizing that her body had been with so many men as “It made me feel low and ashamed to go on living so long. My heart burned like a burning wagon in hell” (pg610). It can be seen that being forced into this career had left a huge burden on her shoulders, one she had never found peace with and was holding in for so long. She even describes it as driving her so crazy she wanted to simply run off and commit suicide. However, she is stopped and instead decides to commit herself to meditation and to enter the way of the Buddha. When the two men appear at her door she is able to finally tell her story in detail. “The lotus flower in my heart opened for you, and before it closed it told everything, from beginning to end. I’ve certainly worked in some dirty professions, but is my heart not pure?” (pg611). Here we can see her final way of dealing with her past. By opening up and telling her story she can come to accept her actions and that she did what she had to do. She can finally be freed from the guilt as she was open about it, and feel that her heart is still pure for fulfilling the tasks she was given in life.

-Brian Baigorria

The narrator is very indifferent and not attached to the men she have affairs with.  She seems to be able to move on and adjust to different situations very quickly from scene to scene in the story.  When she was thirteen, after she and the soldier have been found out, the soldier was punished to death.  At the time she felt injustice for his death, “I was merely punished, but the man – how cruel they were!  He lost his life for what we’d done.”  However, she was able to move on and forget about him very quickly.  Later on when she became a mistress to a lord, she felt happy from the amount of luxury she was given the right to enjoy.  Yet once she learned that the lord became weak and can no longer satisfy her desires she longed to leave.  The narrator was overjoyed the moment she heard about her possible dismissal, “I was amazed to discover that the councilors thought it was my fault.”  At the following setting where she was initially unhappy and even found life to be boring when she had to live underground, she quickly adjusted to the situation and yearned for the priest’s presence.  Nevertheless, toward the end of the scenario when she felt that her life was in danger, she immediately came up with a way to escape and executed her plan of pretending to be pregnant.  She was told to return after giving birth to the baby which she never did, “there was a lot of time left on my contact, but I never went back.”  In the end, although she was temporarily attached to the priest, she was able to get over it within a short amount of time and move on with her life just as she have done with the previous two men.

–   Chi Zhang

I agree with Chi, that it didn’t really matter to the narrator about who the man was or how much he supposedly loved her. When she was separated from him, the narrator would grieve for a short period of time then move on. As if they were just there to please her and she didn’t really value their love the same way the men did.

My view on the narrator’s relationship with men is that she was the instigator of the intercourse between her and the men. When she fell for the low ranked samurai and decided to reply to his letters it showed that, as much as he wanted to meet with her, the narrator wanted to meet with him just as much. But the narrator was the one who took the step in actually trying to meet with him; “It was hard for us to meet, but I managed to arrange things sometimes, and we were able to make love.”

Even when she started to have intercourse with the priest, the narrator was the one who sought after him. She literally went with the jester and the man who carried her stuff around to the temple; pretended to look at the cherry blossom while the jester spoke with the priest, to try and get the priest to meet with her. “We walked right through the gate in the earth walls surrounding the temple, pretending we were going to see the small cherry blossom tree. Then the jester went to the head monk’s quarters.” This really shows that she was always willing to be the one who started the affair with any man she desired.

-Myra Khan

Comment #1 – Mel

Every time that the narrator is in a new relationship that is somewhat negative or negatively affected by something, she will always try to make it positive. When the monk fell in love with her and decided to marry her for three years, she agreed to the contract. However, she didn’t like having sex with the monk and even states, “Living like this was depressing enough, but sleeping with the priest made me even sadder. It was just a job, and there was no love in it.” Eventually, the narrator changed her mindset of the relationship to a positive one and says, “Later I got used to the situation, and I even came to enjoy it.” She does this again when she was working as a calligraphy teacher. She met a man that was her customer and they eventually fell in love. When the man’s parents discovered their relationship and forbid the man to visit her, the narrator continued to write letters to the man. This shows that she wanted to make the obstacle that was affecting their relationship into something positive. It gave her the opportunity to express her love and thoughts to the man through writing. “I was so sad I wrote him every day and had the letter secretly delivered to him at home.” Her action became very positive for their relationship because she had successfully sent the message that she intended to, and the man felt her love for him.

Comment #2 – Radia

Mel mentions how the narrator is able to stay positive whenever she is thrown an obstacle. Thus, the narrator allegedly falls in love with different men. Due to her positivity and the anxious desire to find love, the narrator isn’t able to tell the difference between love and lust until it’s too late. From a young age, the narrator has been attracted to the idea of love. She explains, “Whenever I saw women and men lying together, I’d feel excited… my heart pounded.” The narrator’s idea of love is solely based off sex. Because of her ignorance of reality, she throws herself into these relationships in hopes of finding love and acceptance.  During one of her love conquests she says, “I made love with the man day and night…Gradually, as I expected, he ran dry.” Rather than an emotional connection, their relationship was based off sexual attraction. She gradually learns a relationship built like this wouldn’t last, yet she consistently places herself in situations like this. Initially, the narrator believes this is true love, but a same pattern that appears is the man becomes frail after their numerous sexual encounters.

Coment #3 – Elizaveta

I agree with both ideas. The woman is trying to see beauty and goodness in everything. The author never portrayed her in a negative way even though her jobs sometimes were not accepted by the society.  Saikaku shows perfectly her desire to find love and acceptance, and it turns a sensuous woman into a positive character.

She is very light-minded, passionate and amorous. She easily falls in love. She was nothing, but a mistress for a Lord. Her job was to bring a male heir to the house. However, she sees everything in another light. She told that “with the Lord I was fortunate. He was tender to me, and we enjoyed our lovemaking.”Also, she believes that sexual contact is one of the most critical components of healthy relationships. She thinks that it is a necessity for a human being. While she was talking about the life of a serving woman, she said, “they want to make love with a flesh-and-blood man all the more.” Moreover, it proves here belief that love takes a big part of our life, and no one should escape it.