DUXTON Hill was where I used to hang out in my much younger days, when the grandly conserved shophouses were still sourcing their first tenants. That's circa late 80s and early 90s.

I remember the original Elvis at one corner, where the computer-nerd executive-types hung out and even a Flying Dutchman restaurant which which has no connection with the radio deejay. Then there was J J Mahoney's - a karaoke place for the English-literate but tone-deaf. (Journalists used to hang out there by the way and it's where many story ideas were born in an alcoholically-hopeful haze.)

It was, in those days, pretty atas or high class. Bars were private cosy corners although it had the usual handful of inebriated angmohs who were tolerated by the locals. Good conversations were to be had and a woman, even while alone, was never molested. Nor even put upon.

And yes, bar prices were pretty, well, pricey.

When I returned to the area for a reunion with pub-kakis from work after a hiatus of some eight years or so, I gasped at the changes that have been wrought. The bars I used to frequent were filled with Filipinas at "work''.

No choice, said the owner. They bring in the men. Yes, they do but not the sort that would make a "non-working'' woman like me comfortable. Then I again, I would drink as much as the next man out to get his kicks under the table or in the alley. Someone has let the place go from hip and glamorous to so-so and now downright dinghy and seedy. So who do you call? Vice-busters?

It's a downright shame what the place has become. After so much hoo-haa about the conservation work to protect the heritage of the area, we decided that we can turn the place over to the working women to turn tricks.

Is this a question of economics? Too many pubs fighting for the same dollar? If so, we'd better start figuring out if other currently atas' places will degenerate as well.

By the way, some of the men who entered the pubs were hapless tourists who probably believed Duxton Hill environment was quite different from that of Orchard Towers. Poor things. At least, those who go into the four floors of whores know what they were getting into....

Or do they?

Has it escaped anyone's attention that the working women have spilled out onto the streets and accosting men along the main Orchard Road belt itself? Believe you me, I have no problems with working women hawking their wares in designated confines.

But I do take umbrage when they congregate around taxi stands and the queue line has to form away from them so passengers avoid getting hassled or, in the case of the Caucasian men, pawed upon.

During the Formula One weekend in September in particular, they were in Orchard Road in droves. What was clear was that most were freelancers trying for a piece of the action, rather than the usual heavily-made up types who haunt the area. Simply-dressed, rather than skimpily-dressed, they waited at traffic lights and hooked themselves on the arm of men walking alone.

One Caucasian was escorted across the road and some metres down Orchard Road before he finally shook her off. She returned to her position at the traffic stop somewhat dejectedly.

I was amused. But not so amused as to wonder what my country has become. There's no need for so much seediness and slime to be a hip and happening place, right?