 | E-mail this story |  | Write letter to editor |  | Order a classified ad |
| E-mail this story | | Write letter to editor | | Order a classified ad |
Terry Halifax
Northern News Services
 Telaine Hautka works as an exotic dancer. She resents the stereotypes people place on her profession and would like them to know dancers are just normal people earning a living. - Terry Halifax/NNSL photo |
Hautka got into exotic dancing through a family connection.
"My aunt owned the first agency in Edmonton," Hautka recalls. "My uncle Murray is my agent and he's been in the business about 20 years."
Being around the industry growing up, she saw no stigma attached to the performers and always thought of it as a profession like any other.
"I always wanted to do it," she said. "I get to travel across Canada and I'm in a different place every week."
"The money is also a strong point," she added. "I make more than most doctors or lawyers."
She's socking away her earnings with plans to start her own business.
"I've saved money since the day I started -- I'm going to buy my uncle's tanning salon," she said. "I'd love to have my own business."
With a Jewish psychologist for a mother, she says she grew up in a devoutly religious, stable home. She was a high school cheerleader and has had the same boyfriend since Grade 8.
Hautka says the people who frown on her profession are either jealous or just afraid of change.
Since she's been in Inuvik, she's faced women in the audience name-calling and mocking her while she performs.
"I've never been to a town where I have been treated like I have been by the women here -- it's just unreal," she said. "I mean, if you don't like it, don't watch."
She wonders if the hecklers feel insecure in their relationships or just need someone to vent their frustration on.
At a recent meeting at Ingamo Hall, someone described exotic dancers as being "brutalized and sexually abused women." Hautka says that's preposterous.
"That's not a fact at all," she said. "I've never met one dancer that was sexually abused and I've grown up around them."
At the same meeting, people questioned if the dancers were also engaged in prostitution.
"There are only a couple agencies who we can work for and they would never allow prostitution," she said. "It's a respect issue; we respect for the fact that they give us work and they respect the work we do for them."
"And besides, why would we do that, when we make enough money just for dancing?"
The performance is a three-song set and the audience must stay outside of a three-foot barrier. No touching is allowed.
She says bylaws in Edmonton and Calgary permit table dancing, but there has always been the three-foot barrier rule for dancing.
The agency keeps her busy and she says she can work as much as she wants, but normally spends four weeks on the road and one week at home.
On her days off she returns home to visit with family and pay her bills. She says her co-workers are mostly single moms trying to get debts paid off.
"We are just normal, independent people," she says. "What's on stage is just an act; that's not me -- it's Nikki Zee."
