So much so, when he looks back, he said one thing stood out clearly to him — how his family had always seen him as nothing but an embarrassment. Hailey says he remembers growing up a happy child, and how he was always proud of having bigger brothers and sisters, giving him a sense of guaranteed love and protection.
He said he was wrong because all that changed when his sexuality became the daily subject of ridicule. In , Hailey who was then a year-old Class Eight now Year 8 student at a Suva school, was forced to stay home because as he remembers, no one could pay for his fees any more.
At that time, Hailey, then 14 years, had his own small circle of friends — the same time, he says, that he discovered his sexuality. In an interview with The Fiji Times, he said after that first experience, he did not give sex much thought except that he got money in return. Each client after that gave him the experience of receiving different amounts of money that he could hold in his hand and call his own.
Twelve years later and Hailey is still in the trade, billeted at a shelter for sex workers in a densely-Suva suburb. And like other sex workers, Hailey too determines his charges according to the service he provides his client.
I have to smoke before I go out to work because I am on a certain high that I can boldly approach my clients. I smoke every day before I go out to work. According to Hailey, a lot has changed in this industry since he joined, especially changes with clients. So for clients, as long as they saw us in dresses and with breasts, they tell us to get in their car.
