<p>Narratives of transnational sex work from Nigeria to Europe have failed to consider an important variable: the clients who keep the system running, often through gendered negotiations of power and intimacy that reveal African men’s own precarious masculinities. This article argues that the complexities of present-day transnational sex work from Nigeria to Europe offer a trajectory deeply rooted in past male migrations, beginning from colonial times, after the World War II. Drawing upon data generated over a period of two years fieldwork in Edo State, Nigeria and Paris, France, the study reads the present condition of Nigerian sex workers in France by tracing the history of its emergence from the point of need for more French-speaking labourers, leading to the construction of accommodations for these groups in Paris environs. These housing facilities known as Foyer, served as ‘intermediate houses’ where inhabitants found solace in the African female body as a way of succour and escape from the ravages of exile and nostalgia. Beyond their marginality, the mode of clientele by the men offers feminist insights into the tendencies of abuse and violence by which men, even in their vulnerabilities, undermine the dignity of the female body.</p>