Site Presented By
Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
At the same time that you say there's this culture of being sexually open, most of the women in the book are disgusted at the idea of having sex with Millie. Even most of the prostitutes say no.
I don't know about the rest of Europe, but in most of the U.K. cities, in the red-light districts, they're totally male dominated, and it's very shocking for a female sex worker to be approached by a woman. If women want to behave in a predatory sort of way, if they want to consume sex the way men do, that option isn't open to them really. So on the one hand you have people like Millie and other girls who are sexually adventurous and who want to go explore other things outside sex with your boyfriend, and it's just not practical. In London, there are a few lesbian pockets where they have lap-dancing clubs for women, and maybe you could hire a female escort, but it's very rare.
What made you move to Barcelona when you were 16?
I just needed to get out of my hometown, and I had also read a lot of Barcelona literature by Spanish writers, and I was entranced by the mythology of the city. Talking as we were before about European cities, Barcelona has a much more fluid approach to sexuality. Transgenderism is very big over there, and it's not in U.K. cities. My first experience of gay bars over there was transvestite bars. My mother's from Malaysia, and it's very similar to the scene that's happening over there.
You worked there as a "fixer," setting up johns with prostitutes. What did you learn from that about men and women?
It was an eye-opener. If someone had told me when I was 15 that men go on stag nights, and out of a group of heterosexual men who are all married, who are all in relationships, there's going to be a portion of them who don't want to have sex with a woman but who want to have sex with a lady-boy, I would have found that preposterous. I wouldn't have been able to get my head around it -- [you can't] until you are actually over there and you see it for yourself. I was absolutely staggered by the prevalence of that.
You didn't grow up in Liverpool, but in the nearby town of Warrington -- where, as you have said, you were an outsider for being the only mixed-race child around. Was the big city, meaning Liverpool, an idealized place for you, growing up?
From Warrington, it was a massive leap. It was the first place I'd experienced as being multicultural. As a kid, I was pretty much the only brown face in town. I didn't suffer for that. I think my brother did, but as a girl I was very lucky; men had it harder than everyone else. When I was set up in Liverpool, I was amazed by the different cultures. Yemeni, Somali, Caribbean -- living in near-perfect harmony. We had had some race riots, and it was just after that that I took my big steps into the city. But in terms of sexuality, Liverpool doesn't even have a gay scene.
I was going to ask about that. Last month Liverpool got its first gay arts festival, and there are, according to Meetup.com, at least three Liverpudlian fans of lesbian literature.
That's big!
Is this the beginning of a more sexually diverse Liverpool?
It's quite peculiar that Liverpool is a hedonistic city, and yet the commitment to music and fashion hasn't inspired a gay scene. There are gay clubs that you can go to, but there isn't so much of a scene as there is in Manchester, which is only 20 miles up the road. It's absolutely massive in Manchester. When I wanted to leave Liverpool I accused it of being crude and unsophisticated, and it is a very macho city. The men grow up with very strict male codes to adhere to -- you become a gangster, you become a footballer. It's brutal in a way. And that makes it a lot harder for young gay men to come out. Hopefully that festival will be the start of something, but I don't know. It seemed a bit hideous from what I caught of it.
You've described Liverpool as a "sexy city," which doesn't quite mesh with its reputation as a city in decline.
It had been for years. But when it was on the decline, that's when the city really was at its hedonistic peak. All the people who were on the dole and receiving benefits, it didn't stop any of them going out every weekend. They didn't have to go to work Monday morning. You'd go to parties on a Friday night and not leave the house until Tuesday or Wednesday, and all that was made possible by the unemployment crisis. People found a new religion, they found a voice, in rave culture, in acid house. The dance club Cream started in Liverpool. It's the biggest super-club, it's the biggest phenomenon to ever happen in the history of dance culture. That happened when Liverpool was at the low end. Now we have more restaurants, more art-house cinemas, more galleries, but it kind of detracts from just going out when the only choices you have are a pub or a club or to stay in. So you go out with money in your pocket, and that's all there is to spend it on, hedonism.
