Toulouse: in Fondeyre, prostitution in broad daylight in the middle of trucks
For years, prostitutes have made the industrial zone of Fondeyre their workplace. In broad daylight and in the middle of the trucks, they wait for their customers. Reporting.
Amid torn condom wrappers strewn on the floor, Michelle* is sitting on a wooden chair. Encased in thick coats, the patient prostitute. It is 4 degrees. “There is no one. I’ve been here since noon and haven’t had a single client yet,” Michelle says in an Eastern European accent. This Friday, at 2 p.m., the industrial zone of Fondeyre is deserted. A few trucks are parked in front of the sex worker. Before, Michelle worked at night. “But at the start of the pandemic everything changed, she explains. With the different specific curfews we have become accustomed to working during the day. And then now at night, it’s too cold”.
“Granny” is 70 years old
Her friend Marta*, another prostitute, joins her, coffee and bottle of water in hand. “We would like to be in town. But it’s forbidden and there’s a lot of competition,” she notes. Behind a truck, in a car, the one we call “granny”, ends her pass. At almost 70 years old, the woman from Eastern Europe has not hung up. “It’s a hassle. We do what we can,” she says summarily. In several streets of this industrial area prostitutes worked. “Yes, I speak a little French,” one of them tells us before telling us off: “Sorry, I don’t talk to journalists. Fondeyre welcomes dozens of sex workers. Day and night. “The Covis crisis has changed the schedules. It was rarer to see prostitutes in broad daylight before”, indicates the association “Grisélidis”, which helps prostitutes in the sector. She continues: “It is a place where there is no habitation. There is a large car park, which makes it easier to pass…” 45 minutes have passed. Marta decides to change location. About ten minutes later, a car stops at his height. On the lips of the sex worker, we can read what she repeats all the time: “30 euros the pipe, 50 the pipe and love”. The door opens.