Lydia Caradonna

Yea exactly the normal way

Use a straw for the liquid then eat the rest w a spoon 😎

Ate my train eggs this morning pure bliss x

Me: you’re late
Client: only by a tiny bit
Me: I started and finished a whole NYT sudoku in the time I waited for you
Client: that would make you a world record holder
Me: yeah, I know 😎

Leon Shakshuka pots or Itsu miso poached egg pots and the yolk is just jammy enough not to spill everywhere 🌚 usually wait five mins to get to work and eat it but I’ve been known to partake on a train

Any establishment with poached eggs to go on my way to work hates to see me coming

Having a very drawn out argument about why I’d prefer she didn’t open all her Christmas presents now and she’s like “well I make all my own choices!!! You told me!!!”

Grwm hauling a massive bag across town looking like an unwashed gremlin so I can commandeer my best friends bathroom for an everything shower because my bathroom flooded

Originally posted September 2021, edits made to reflect the 2 more!! raids I’ve endured since then.
Note: Modern Slavery Act is the name of legislation passed in 2015. I’m not comparing raids to slavery, the Conservatives were trying to rebrand anti immigrant law as progressive

What do you suppose you do next? I’ll tell you what I did. I had nightmares for three weeks straight and still get upset when someone knocks on my front door too loudly. Welfare concerns? Tell a fucking new one

As they’re leaving (with your earnings in tow) you realise two of the cops are regular clients. Because they usually are. Their concern for your welfare is only as thin as the paper they printed the warrant on. They fuck you on Tuesday and raid you on Wednesday

You count yourself lucky, though, because sometimes the cops bring guns or even helicopters. Sometimes they invite the press to take pictures of you (because you’re not a person so they don’t worry about how this would impact you and prevent you from ever getting another job)

If you were trafficked, by the way, you’d end up in immigration detention. They don’t actually rescue or help trafficking survivors. But you’re not trafficked, so they’ll just issue a closure notice on your workplace instead. Not like you need to eat or pay rent!

After they’ve groped you all enough and logged your government ID into their systems as evidence, the men tell you that they’re here for your benefit. “Anything you want to tell us?” they ask. This is the full extent of their trafficking investigation.

The cops demand your ID. Nobody explains your rights or that you have options. Sometimes they lie to you and say you have to give ID or you’ll face arrest. One of your friends cries. She’s a migrant. This might affect her right to stay in the country. But they’re “helping” apparently

Police can and will routinely seize all of your cash under the proceeds of crime act or even just for “investigative purposes” and I’ve yet to meet someone who has been able to get it back. You’ll never guess what we have to do to make the money up (more prostitution!)

The police split you and your friends up. They’ll let you get dressed only if you ask and then they watch you the whole time. Upstairs they’re emptying the safe and the cash register while the maid cries. That’s all your earnings for the day, gone. It’s “evidence” apparently

Which, let me tell you, feels extra insulting. Having men raid your workplace and then inviting a white Christian lady who is all wide eyed from the poverty tourism she’s doing to tell you that Jesus thinks you’re better than this as the full extent of the resources she’s offering you

In one incident I supported recently, police fulfilled local requirements to have female officers present by having a lone female PCSO in the car outside so they could put her name on the paperwork. The closest to a social worker I’ve ever seen was a random volunteer from a local church group

It does not feel like it’s about your welfare when you get held against a wall while a man runs his hands all over your half clothed body looking for a weapon. No female officers, no social workers. This is for our “safety” but it feels like more assault

Four men kick the front door in and swarm into the staff area. And even though it’s obvious what you are - prostitutes, the very people they’re here to “check on” during these raids - they are not gentle when they grab you. They are not kind when they pin you against the wall

Because raids don’t happen like they do on TV. They don’t come in, arrest a shadowy pimp, and extend an arm out to you and say “everything is going to be okay now”. It’s you and your friends half dressed in the staff room. All of you are sexual violence survivors.

At first you don’t know what’s happening. There is a very real, very awful moment, where your logical brain goes “oh, someone is breaking in and they’re going to rape us, rob us or kill us”. When you realise it’s police, you’re not sure which possibility is worse.

Imagine you’re at work one day, on your break, even. You’re in the staff room chatting shit with your friends. Maybe you’re mid getting changed, half dressed. It’s been a normal day. You and three friends. And then four men kick the front door in.

I feel like people are often keen to dismiss brothel raids as something neutral. Sometimes people don’t understand why I complain about being caught up in Modern Slavery Act raids. Obviously I’m fine, right? Like, I’m not in prison right now so I’m fine? Nah actually

Doctors round a table: We need to solve cancer, which will always exist in some form but is exacerbated by behavioural factors like sun exposure and smoking
Doctors child she couldn’t find a sitter for: we should ban it mummy for cancer is bad
UK govt: make that child the health secretary NOW

“I want to criminalise paying for sex because women’s bodies shouldn’t be for sale” okay babe!! The sex industry still exists in every country that has ever criminalised paying for sex so your approach doesn’t match your apparent goal but cool good for you

It’s harder and harder to tolerate “ban the sex industry” as a realistic grown up argument given that’s not a possible thing and has never been managed anywhere ever. Like you don’t think it should exist? That’s great sweetie. It does though

Mad the number of people who sleep with their phone on loud and then get arsey when ur message wakes them up… what if I was a spam text? Take some responsibility for yourself and turn your notifications to silent

A white male child with a gas mask points towards the camera. He is the lonely child from Doctor Who

Grown men seeing a 25 year old with larger than average honkers