Sex in quarantine: with the "telos" closed, how couples do to find each other

Nahuel Gallotta

08/25/2020 - 6:01

• Clarín.com
• Cities

On March 19, at 9:17 p.m., Alberto Fernández announced the quarantine from Quinta de Olivos and said: "Starting at 00:00 tomorrow, Argentines must submit to social, preventive and mandatory isolation . This means that no one can move from their residence; everyone must stay at home. "

That same day, at the same time, the owners or managers of the 120 temporary shelters in the city had to knock on the doors of the rooms of the couples who had paid for the night and give them the news: they had to leave the place . They never imagined that 158 ​​days later, their hotels would continue as they did that night. Empty .

" Every five minutes I reply to a message or an email, " says Carlos Lalín, who manages the accounts of 14 hotels. And he details: "They ask if we are open. They cannot believe that we are still closed. Many of our clients live with their children and their parents , and they came once or twice a week. Or couples who do not live together, who live in their houses with their children: the only place they could have sex was our hotels. "

In the queries, there are requests of all kinds: "can an exception be made?"; "I have been a customer for years: when they see my truck they will recognize me. I went every week"; or "Let me pass. I'm a customer; I'm not a cop."

Carlos Lalín manages the Unica hotel, among others. "Many of our clients live with their children and their parents, and they came once or twice a week," he says.

José Capello, President of the Argentine Federation of Hourly Accommodation (FADAPH), believes that there should not be a single couple who has not seen each other for five months. "They are the same," he assures. "In much less favorable places, such as a car , or they ask a friend for a private apartment. We do not understand why they do not allow us to open, if the couples who are going to visit us have already been seeing each other for a long time . Without a meeting place intimate, prone and logical, a negative social humor is generated " .

At the beginning of the week they were disappointed again. "The hotel business is working again in the City of Buenos Aires," was the announcement from the Chief of Staff. The detail is that the measure applies to conventional hotels. The "telos" must keep waiting . Each has between fifteen and thirty employees. For this reason, they estimate that there are 2,000 direct jobs and another 10,000 indirect ones, linked to items that assist hotels such as laundries, furniture stores or self-employed workers who do repairs or maintenance.

"We are part of the hotel sector, with the same union," says Capello. "We ask that there be no more discriminatory treatment. If ultimately we provide the same: an accommodation service to people . We receive the ATP, but we live in continuous debt. The work activity of many people is at stake. We have been billing for five months zero. Ours happens exclusively in person. We cannot sell anything online. As of today, 10% of telos will not open again. "

Alberto López, manager of O'tello, says that they already have sanitary measures that allow them to open. Photo: Juan Manuel Foglia

O'tello was born in 1988. His current manager is Alberto López. He comments that also, like all his colleagues, he spends his time answering messages and emails from clients who ask when they can visit them. "If something characterized us, it was the sense of discretion and cleanliness. People who come are not going to meet anyone. They enter by car or walk and go directly to the room, without touching anything. We already bought sanitary bows and guns for temperatures We don't understand why we are still closed. "

Today, to pay the rest of the salaries of the 20 employees, plus services, ART, social charges and general expenses, they asked for a loan. The second, actually. The one they asked now is also to pay the first installments of the one they were granted as soon as the mandatory quarantine was decreed. The three months of grace passed, and as they were still closed and they had to pay the first installment, they requested another. And about the situation, he says: "We believe that we will only be able to get out of debt in June 2021. Because it is not that we believe that they will let us open and people will line up to enter. We will work little."

Carlos estimates that the monthly expenses of a hotel accommodation are around one million pesos . And like López, he believes that they will not work much. Before arguing, cite the example of Rosario. He says that the average number of visits reached 50 couples per day . And that since the opening, between 14 and 16 couples enter . "With that you don't even cover the expenses," he says.

No customers. Accommodation hotels are closed since March. There are 120 in the City. Photo: Juan Manuel Foglia.

"People do not have money, they are afraid and I think that during the quarantine many pairs of lovers broke up, because they had no where to meet," he explains. "And no matter how much we open, as there are many closed places, people have nowhere to meet. Those couples who met in a bowling alley, a bar, the gym or the street, and then came to our hotels, they are not going to form . more with colleges, universities, closed municipalities, plus office home, and many are complicated found in our hotels Another thing is that the quarantine made lost habits and customs. we had marriages that came once a week . Quarantine kills you. "

For López  , dating couples also broke up . "We are facing a quarantine of very ugly distancing for many people. From a single and single chat site they constantly ask me when we open. How do they manage to have meetings?" 

Finally, they speak of a client much less known by the general public, who would also choose them if they could: doctors, sales brokers and anyone who prefers to save by paying  the night in a hotel accommodation rather than a room in a conventional hotel ( that charges the whole day, no matter how much it is used for one night). "It's not just money. It's a question of comfort. Telos have a presence in all Buenos Aires neighborhoods; hotels don't. And also in the suburbs and inland . For many people we are a closer option than the traditional hotel ", Capello concludes. 

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