Prague's main train station is the first thing many tourists see when they reach the city, but it's also one of the city's best-known sites for a particular kind of sex tourism. The prostitutes who have worked here say this is where foreign men come to find the young male sex workers known here as rent boys. Although at 28, Kevin is a former male prostitute, he comes here to meet up with friends who are still in the business.
He says he hates the place, because it reminds him of the experiences he's had here. He had so many clients that he turned to the drug pervitin to stay awake all night. And you meet them without thinking about it, because if you were to remember each client you had or didn't have then you would go crazy. But the people usually remember you, and that's the worst. Kevin and two other former male prostitutes told Radio Prague what it's like for these children and young men who are one of Prague's human tourist attractions.
They paint a bleak picture of predominantly orphans and runaways caught up in a world of drug addiction, isolation and the ever-present threat of sexually transmitted diseases. Kevin began prostitution at 16 while still in school. His first client was a family member of his teacher.
He quit three years ago because he couldn't get enough clients. He looked too old to compete with the more sought-after teenagers. And since he is Roma, he says prospective clients feared him because of negative Gypsy stereotypes. They thought he intended to rob them. Like many of these prostitutes, Kevin was raised in an orphanage. The Czech Republic has more children in orphanages than any other E. Kevin says when he left the Moravian children's home, he was unprepared for life. So I ended up on the street because I was 18 and had just gotten out of an orphanage.
Except for the sounds of the station below and the freeway outside, the scene is like that of any other coffee house. That's until you've spent a few hours here. You may see young men and boys spend their time moving from table to table, sometimes being joined by older men, sometimes walking off with one of them. And it looks like they're just chatting, but usually the conversation goes like this: 'Where are you from? How much do you go for? What do you want to do?
