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The cost to manage the house and the maintenance falls completely on thevictims who, as well as the debt, find themselves having to pay rents out ofproportion in relation to the value of the apartment, unbelievable bills, andexpenses for food.“I paid 150 [thousand lira, Ed.] for electricity each month, we were 4 persons,the rent was 500 thousand” (Interview Victim No.4).“I had to pay the rent which was 500 thousand lira and we are 7 or 12, eachone paid 500 thousand lira, see how much money comes in. When the bill for gasarrives, no one saw the bill; we paid 350 thousand lira for two months. To eat, tobuy mashed potatoes, each one must put 20 thousand lira; we are 9” (InterviewVictim No.10).“For rent I must pay 500 thousand lira each month, to eat 200 thousand liraeach week. Always the same, we are 3” (Interview Victim No.8).“We were 11 in the house and every week we gave 150 thousand lira to eat”(Interview Victim No.7).The majority of the girls in the houses move by train or by bus to reach theirplace of work and often such transportation represents the only time during whichthey can sleep.“I used to leave the house at 6, or at 5.40 in the morning, and entered at 3, 4, inthe morning, I slept an hour, an hour and a half (...) if I don’t sleep on the train. Iremember how many times I wound up in Pisa. You go to sleep; the journey lastsone hour and 15 minutes. Then you get up quickly to take the next train to arrive atTarquinia” (Interview Victim No.7).“I worked morning, nights, I never slept. One perhaps sleeps three hours perday” (Interview Victim No.2).Those who work at night then manifest the difficulty of not knowing the city, ofnot being able to find the way and know a minimum of daytime life: “You go in thestreet at night, in the day you sleep, you only live at night. Like this I don’t knowhow the city functions. I know nothing of Turin ” (Interview Victim No.12).The isolation level in each case is quite high also for those who work during theday, especially in the beginning; they only know the way that takes them to theplace of work. During all the coercive period, depending on the madam, the sociallife of the victim is forced within the limits of meeting the other girls: from thesharing of transportation means to get to work, the place of prostitution, to thehouse in which they live, up to the consumption of video cassettes of Nigerian soapoperas, acquired in the “parallel” sales circuits: the social life of the victims seemsto be in an autonomous universe, self-referring. Clients excepted, they have fewand unstable contacts with the external reality.Exoneration from work in the case of illness is not foreseen, unless serious, noteven when they menstruate or if they are pregnant.“Every day you must go on the street, when you are menstruating they putcotton not to let it come out, can you imagine to how many girls it ended up in thestomach?” (Interview Victim No.2).