Ernestine Pastorello

Ernestine the Expat: Insomniac

Added 2020-04-03 16:00:08 +0000 UTC

Sunday, 19 January 2020, 3:36

In bed

Paris, France

So here I am. I’m in Paris, it’s 3:36 am, and I am an insomniac succumbing to the effects of having too much good wine and bread pushed into my body (these are both taboo foods for me in moments of high stress although they constitute the better part of existence, in my opinion).

I have the great good fortune of having a very dear old family friend who lives in Paris who tolerates my presence when I’m in town. (Well—it’s rather more than that. Last time I visited her, I only stayed for two days, which made her very “faché” with me.) One rents an Airbnb as well, and voilá!:

A week-long business trip to settle my mind in my favorite city in the world and go through both the mourning process of the life I’ve left behind and the jet-lag process of the time zone I left behind.

Berlin is the big thing on the horizon. Given that I’ve just done the most “good kind of crazy” [–my therapist] thing I have ever done in my life, my mind is remarkably settled. But imagine, if you will:

You have a beautiful house with a beautiful garden that you have decorated and planted, respectively, with a beautiful (if temperamental) partner of 4 years whom you adore, befrolicked by two sweet cats who you rescued from a shelter and they rescued you right back;
You have a profitable (if totally illegal) career that’s ticking along nicely, jumping a tax bracket each year until…
A stupid law is passed, and all hell breaks loose in your chosen industry in that particular country; so you:
Wait for 2 years for conditions to improve;
See no improvement;
Make a hair-brained scheme;
Pack all your worldly belongings into thirty boxes in the attic;
Leave all of the aforementioned behind and cross the ocean;
Land in a foreign country with some language skills but not fantastic (fortunately we all speak the same language during sex).

I am 33.

When I was 4 years old, I started kindergarten, and, on the first day, told my soon-to-be best friend that I “just got back from Paris where I went for the weekend and I have one brother who lives in the closet.”

So basically, I have been dreaming about doing this—really begging the universe for an opening—for about 30 years. My mother and I joke that she passed her utter adoration of this city to me via amniotic fluid; the first time I set foot here as a sentient adult, I fell in love.

I always thought it would be Paris. That would have been my preference. But a year of research illuminated a different pathway—one that led to Berlin. I see no need to bore you with bureaucracy, but suffice it to say, visas for sex work don’t exist–not a thing–and so, in a fantastically ironic twist of fate, the visa I’m going for is not for Ernestine the escort (and hopefully soon-to-be toast of some fabulous spa bordello) but for Ernestine the dancer. Berlin is one of the only cities in the world that has an artist’s visa, and that list of things you have to prove actually works, because I’m actually an artist (plenty of people—especially sex workers, because y’all leave us no other choice–get this visa because they want to be in the country legally, and this is an easier path compared to other routes one might take to appease the German government. That is, you have to prove less shit. You must prove to them that you’re actually an artist who can be of “cultural and economic benefit to the city of Berlin.”

Well, check—I think—and check, for sure. With 10 months of the Ballet Burlesque Project under my belt and coming fresh off my choreographer’s residency, the art form I have been cultivating since the age of 7 is finally bearing real, tangible, worldly-useful fruit (in your face, Daddy).

So one week here to get my bearings and stay up all night crying about my left-behind boyfriend and cats, and then my JOB will be to hustle every burlesque venue in the city, soliciting letters of intent to hire me as a freelance femme fatale en pointe. That and, you know, finding a place to live.

From there, one of four things happen (just so you have all the details because there will be a quiz).

But first, I must explain legalization to y’all, because it’s very confusing.

In order to work as any sort of hooker legally in Germany, you have to obtain something called a Prostitutionstätigkeit (yes, when pronounced, it sounds like “prostitute” then the thing you say when someone sneezes but it is a legal requirement to work as a hooker of any sort in Germany because trafficking). It’s basically a paper that says “the government knows I’m doing sex work and is ok with it.” However, for non-EU residents to obtain this card, you have to have a work visa. If you walk into a magnificent spa bordello and say “Can I work here?” the first question out of their mouth is “Do you have papers?”

P.s., ladies who want to tour in Germany as independent escorts, as far as I can tell, no one ever checks this—hence my ability to earn money while sorting out this crazy venture thank god, although Berlin is not a good market for independents because the gents have so many easier options, so it’s not a viable standalone career in Berlin.

So, back to my possible life outcomes (in order of increasing splendidness):

I fail spectacularly, have a complete meltdown, and return to the US in a state of abject shame and self-horror;
I get the coveted artist’s visa to dance, start performing burlesque, and forget that anything else exists;
I get the coveted artist’s visa to dance but then am not granted the Prostitutionstätigkeit, and thus cannot do what I came here to do—i.e., prowling around a magnificent spa bordello, no screening, no advertising, and—most importantly—the full force and protection under German law and a lot of backup in the building if anyone is a complete dick; hence, I would have to make a tough decision (e.g., whether or not to stay in Berlin or to try a decrim but not legalized country and start all over);
I get the damn prozzie card (personal shorthand) and live happily ever after as a fille de maison;
I manage to *convince* the Sicilian government to give me an Italian passport because my father was born there and I managed to liquefy all the red tape with my eyelashes and hence can work in whatever situation I want for however long I want to. Fuck visas.

You may now be able to relate to a continuous feeling of wanting to throw up all the time.

The thing is.

IF I succeed at this…ok, maybe a bordello isn’t my scene, or maybe Germany isn’t my scene—good friends have been reminding me a lot over the past few days that, if I end up hating everything, I can always go back. Or somewhere else. Start over again. Find my spot. Problematically, to my type A brain, this qualifies as nothing short of a spectacular failure (to get to Berlin and not like it or to not have everything work out such that I can support myself and be happy at the same time). However, in an effort to be less ridiculous in general and less obnoxious specifically to all those who care about me, my new motto is, “As long as we’re exploring and having adventures, we have not failed” (in the “royal we” sense, but also because there are two of me, Ernestine and a civilian gal most of you haven’t met. More on that later).