"That, son, is called a brothel"

Those are the words that should have come out of the father's mouth, but no. Instead it was a somewhat awkward (though highly amusing) conversation. At least it was for me.

***

Now it's no secret that there are about six or seven brothels in my area. For the record, I have not frequented ANY of them and therefore can't say with any authority how many do actually exist. I know of two because they have public faces. The rest are the stuff of gossip and urban legend, though I'm inclined to think they probably are around.

Of the two registered brothels, one has a website (obviously believing they're real high brow). I came to know of the other through the mail. Not that it was one of those dodgy advertising leaflets. No, it was in fact a letter addressed directly to me; sent by my local council. Very thoughtful of them, wouldn't you say?

One of the brothels on our main street was planning some renovations and under current legislation all local residents must be informed; allowing them the opportunity to provide feedback. As part of the information pack they mailed me, a floor-plan of the proposed renovations was provided.

A note, ladies and gentlemen: brothels don't house bedrooms. Nor do they house bathrooms. A brothel's bedrooms are actually known as "service areas". Their bathrooms are described as "wash rooms".

Until this point, I had always thought there was a brothel down there somewhere; that the Chinese massage parlour probably came with happy endings, but I'd never really bothered to investigate. Now I knew not only of its existence, but its exact address, the number of customers they could service at any one point in time and where the closest fire exits were.

Two months later I got that same letter, this time with a footnote informing me I only had six weeks to provide feedback. One month after that I got ANOTHER letter reminding me there was now only a fortnight till the deadline. Now in case I hadn't fully appreciated what the first letter was saying - that there was a brothel in town and it was getting an upgrade, then by the third letter I sure as hell knew pretty much every single detail of it. Talk about free advertising!

***

Walking home the other day, I passed a father and son who were actually standing outside that very brothel. The kid, probably seven years old, had asked,

"Dad, what do they sell here?"

The poor man! I wasn't able to hear his whole answer (as I didn't want to be caught eaves dropping) but I heard phrases like "keep men happy..." and "make you feel good with their hands"... all phrases that drew unfathomably large frowns of confusion from the boy. There was no direct answer. And every time the dad used another abstract expression for sex or blowjob, I could see the boy wanting to interject with even more questions.

And the more the dad talked, the more curious the son got, and the more I was reminded of the council's letters.

"Keep talking Dad, and you're going to end up as some free advertising yourself."