Chapter 1

Marie was a filipina who had worked in Dubai for several years as a nanny and housemaid for a rich local family. Her main task was to look after the older girl who was 15 when she started working there. Now this daughter, Noora, was 18 and she had applied to study in a college in UK. Her parents were liberal, so they agreed that Noora could study there on two conditions. The first condition was that she had to study in a smaller city and not in London because there were too many temptations there, and also too many Arab boys. The second condition was that she had to take Marie with her to cook and look after her. Of course Noora agreed immediately to the conditions and started her search for a college in UK. Finally, she discovered that there was a course she liked in Nottingham, in the middle of England. Noora and her father travelled to Nottingham to register her for her course and to find an apartment for her and Marie to live in. They found a nice two-bedroom apartment in front of the canal and near the university. The only thing now was to apply for a visa for Marie and wait for the course to start, so Noora and her father returned to Dubai.

Marie had never travelled outside Philippines apart from to and from Dubai when she returned home on her annual holiday. She was married and had a family back home, who were being cared for by her husband. Unlike many other filipinos, Marie’s husband was a good family man who cared for his wife and children. He had never strayed or had other women, and Marie had also been completely faithful to him. However, she had once read a book called The Story of O after which she often had dark thoughts and fantasies that she had never discussed with her husband because she knew that he would be horrified to hear her innermost secret fantasies. Marie had never imagined that she could experience any of her fantasies, and they had remained safely hidden away in her mind – until she went to work in Dubai.

Dubai was a whole new world for Marie. Of course, Manila in the Philippines was a modern city of towers and traffic, but Dubai was light years ahead in its buildings, its shopping malls, its pace, its wealth, and its vice. The main vice in Dubai was prostitution, which was tolerated as it attracted a lot of customers from nearby Arab countries, especially from Saudi Arabia where any hint of prostitution was punished by a sentence of caning and prison, and for the Saudi citizens with shame on their families, which would be a major social blow to the man and to his family. So, Saudi men took their wives shopping in Dubai, while they indulged in a little ‘extracurricular’ activity in the bars and with the ladies of the night. Face was saved, and all were happy. Marie first learned about the very active sex scene in Dubai when she was given a day off to go to church. There she met other filipinas who invited her to go to a bar in the afternoon. Marie had no friends in this new city, so she accepted, even though she did not really drink alcohol much.

The bar that was selected was in a five-star hotel, and Marie was amazed at the décor, and also at the price of drinks! She knew that she could not afford to spend a huge proportion of her salary on drinks, so she slowly sipped a beer while her new friends started to become tipsy. As the alcohol hit them, their tongues got looser, and they started to gossip about other filipinas who were not present. Marie listened to the stories that they told about how some filipinas made extra ‘pocket money’ by meeting and fucking strangers. They met these strangers in bars and went back to their hotel rooms for sex. Marie was both shocked and intrigued and wanted to know more. From the gossip, she learned that Western men were especially attracted to filipinas or pinays as they are called in Philippines. Pinays were more popular with Western men because they were able to speak English well and they were eager to please. Marie’s heart raced when she heard this, as one of her fantasies which she had read about in The Story of O was to please a man in any way that he wanted. She looked around carefully and she saw that there were many men sitting alone or in small groups and that they always looked up to check out every woman who walked into the bar. And there were a lot of women entering the bar although it was very early in the evening. Marie observed the interactions between the women and the men for some time, while all the time her mind was racing. Eventually, she allowed her friends to drag her to another table where a group of men were sitting and drinking.

There were four men at that table, all of them Western men. Marie and her new friends were four pinays, so it seemed just right if the four women hooked up with the four men. Marie was not sure if she really wanted to hook up with anyone because she had always been faithful to her husband. However, the idea of sex with an anonymous stranger was exciting, although it also made Marie feel guilty. The men paid for drinks for the four women and began asking about where they were from and what their jobs were. A few drinks later, Marie was more relaxed and suddenly realized that her friends seemed to have paired off with a man each, which left her talking to the last man. Marie was now feeling tipsy because she really didn’t drink much, but the feeling of freedom that the alcohol gave her was what made her feel good. Suddenly, Marie noticed that two of her new friends and two of the men had disappeared, leaving two pinays and two men. That was when one of the men suggested that they should move to someplace quieter where they could have a private party. Marie wasn’t sure what that meant, but she liked the idea of a party, so she nodded in agreement. Her new pinay friend also agreed, so the whole party left the bar and went to the lifts.