Hong Kong
A commenter left a message that read, “I am a 25 year old cheek toucher,” and “I admit I have more sex since I moved to Beijing but I don’t visit prostitutes.”
I was thinking well no, coz you’re 25. He’s already bragging about the women, how much he earns and his important role in “Educating Chinese People” and how Chinese men are jealous coz he gets the “best of your women.” It wouldn’t suprize me in about 10 -15 years he would end up pretty much like this.
(This is placed on my blog by a commenter, it’s from another blog here in Hong Kong. It also includes naked photos of the women he talks about. The commenter kindly deleted the area and also the names of the women.)
spotted Sxxxxx, a [nationailty withheld] “working girl” who claims to be in love with me [Note to male readers — should you be approached my this girl, I’d suggest giving it a miss. (this is linked to the photo of this woman) She’s crap in bed . . . unless the prospect of being paid increases her enthusiasm significantly. It might, given she claims to charge HK$3,000 a go, which only proves there actually is a sucker born every minute]. Bad sex or not, it was three o’clock in the morning and I’m newly girlfriendless, so I permitted myself to be persuaded to take her home with me
Saturday, March 22, 2003
There is no way I can ever return to the West. Living here has rendered me unfit for polite society. Last night I spent several hours trying to convince two Chinese sisters that they should both come home with me. That they didn’t slap me, much less give a definitive no, speaks volumes.Saturday, September 13, 2003
In a rare display of public spiritedness, I’m taking Lxxxx (a [nationality withheld] girl with the most astonishing breast implants) on a visa run to Macau this afternoon, thereby ensuring her continued contribution to Hong Kong’s service industry.Sunday, September 7, 2003
I awoke this morning with a poisonous hangover and an unspeakably ugly girl in my bed. I know, I know, ‘looks aren’t everything,’ you say. ‘Maybe she has a wonderful personality’. Perhaps she does. I’ll never know, as she didn’t speak a word of English.Saturday, May 17, 2003
I went dancing with Pxxxxx and Mxxxx last night, then, when they petered out, ran into Lxxxxx and Vxxxx at Dusk ’till Dawn. finally stumbled in at around 8:00 AM and awoke this afternoon feeling smug and self-satisfied . . . until I realized I spent HK$7,000 last night without the remotest possibility of getting laid.ADDENDUM: I also stopped by Laguna last night -where I noticed an Indonesian girl with an absolutely extraordinary body. Slender, hard, perfectly proportioned and with the most spectacular legs. I could not take my eyes off her. Then she stepped into the light and I saw she had a face like a lemur. Monkey face or not,if I see her out again, I’m going for it.
I’s not always something people jump into when they move to Asia, it’s generally a progessive slide, takes a little time, and when the man is forty, it’s pretty much what happens. Although some do like my old co-workers from the US. Because of the older men who were also working in our company they were introduced to the Wan Chai scene pretty much on arrival.
One of them I had a lot of affection for. He was as I liked to call him, “The best hearted asshole in the world.”
Once when on a business trip I wanted to see where it was all the other men were going, the other guys thought it would be funny, he refused because, “It’s just going to break your heart Yan. No, don’t. Please don’t.”
He was extremely honest and good humoured about it, because he understood that he did go down and sleep with prostitutes rather frequently on a weekly bases. He understood anyone’s distaste for it as well as the realities of it. “I don’t like the way the women are treated, but I can’t help it because I also adore the young, hard bodies of these brown chicks.”
He was always kind to me, much like I am sure he was kind to the girls he picked up. The girls called him “Lucky Love,” because he was good looking and a gentleman. In the end, when he moved back to the US, he married a 19 year old Indonesian girl, who he met in one of the bars, he was 34. I wished them luck, and I hope she has a better life than the one she would have had in Hong Kong.
Other people I know didn’t have as nice a story. People I grew up with. Friends of mine. Not so much people who went to my school or the bigger English private schools situated in the city. Most of them went to boarding schools in the UK or smaller less prestigious ones than the one I went to. They came to Hong Kong when they were 12, 15, didn’t grow up here felt really displaced, decided to stay on, maybe didn’t go to college.
They end up working with a bunch of older expats who also quickly turned them onto the girlie bars which are mainly meeting points for expat men and South East Asian Girls who were tricked into working in Hong Kong as “dancers.”
At first they are just there. These good, nice boys who I was friends with. They talk to the girl who isn’t really working, they meet the ones who might come down to hang out with other Filipino girls and go dancing. The working girls treat them nice, become friends, sometimes they go out with them, and sometimes the relationships don’t work out. Sometimes the guys are really hurt because they realize that they were being used for their money, sometimes, it doesn’t work out because it just doesn’t.
And depending on the guy, they either leave Hong Kong, knowing this is not really the way to go, or they end up more entrenched in the scene. First they get a hand job, then maybe a blow job, just once, because they were really drunk, because the girl was really good to them, didn’t seem like a pro, because they spent all night talking, but it’s still their work and they should still pay up.
Then it just slowly happens more often, and at some point they end up paying for sex, which they justify by “it’s just for fun, no one’s feelings are hurt, it’s just like picking up someone at a bar and having a one night stand. Except I pay for it. I don’t go with any girl I don’t actually like.”
Then one day when none of us are looking, it just happens. You meet them again, and they are telling you about their holiday in the Philippines, in Thailand, about the girls they fucked, about the threesomes they had, about this and that, and the rest of his old friends, either come along for the ride or never call them again. Sometimes they marry one of the girls, mostly it’s ended up in divorce, with her taking half his money, which many of us personally think, good for the girl. Hope she has fun with it.
I just think it’s sad that’s what Hong Kong can do to people. Obviously they had their own insecurities and weakness to start of with, but at our late 20s and early 30s, ask anyone who grew up here who isn’t Chinese, they will have a story like that to tell you.
Seeing really normal guys, not even sleezy or mean turn out that way. It’s disappointing because you remember them when they were 18, just like you, and then becoming someone you rather not know.
The one that upset me the most, was someone who I not only knew in HK, but also during my time in college in the states, justifying it to me and couldn’t understand why his girlfriend left by saying, “Well, it was only a blow job.” I never really spoke to him again. A lot of other people felt truly disappointed too. It was the beginning of the end of our group of friends, as people split between, allowing him around and not wanting him around at all.
I think it happens in other places, surely the boys went down to Tijuana, which is a border town between the US and Mexico and sometimes got involved, but it’s not right in their city. It’s not two minute walks from their work. It doesn’t become a life style, which it is for a group of expats in Hong Kong.
Those people who are currently acting all surprised and insulted I am bringing it up seems to forget everyone in this city knows about them. It’s a famous stereotype, which sadly is very true. I guess no one ever talks about it to them to remind them the majority of the world honestly don’t think much of men who pays for sex on a consistent basis.
It’s like these guys like to pretend it’s all in fun, all good natured, except all those women who are there, were either tricked into coming to HK as “dancers” then forced to work. Or came here to work as maids and had a second career because their lives are so dead end and they have a huge family to support back at home that doing this with a chance for “Lucky Love,” someone who might actually fall in love with them, marry them and take them out of their lives, is worth the chance.
It’s not good natured at all. It’s a sex trade of the rich and poor countries, it’s a sex trade between the high earning men and women who had no opportunities. If you’re a woman, and sometimes a young boy, it’s one way out.
These girls might pretend they enjoy in front of their customers, these men might like to lie to themselves, but all it takes is an hour talking to these women, which I have once or twice to know how much they hate their lives, and their work and what’s going on. They will always say, “What can you do? That’s what happens if you are poor, and we all need money.” Sometimes the really smart ones will tell you, “My country is poor, this part of the world is poor, this is what we do.”
Yes, most of Asia is poor, it’s easy to forget that when you live in Hong Kong, when you think of Japan, Singapore, even Shanghai as Asia. But how many people think of Thailand, Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, the rest of China and all those places and what’s the realities of these places so what happens in Wan Chai can happen.
The Asian Sex Trade is alive and happening. Due to the unequal distribution of wealth in this part of the world it’s so much more obvious and wide spread and people like me, normal people who just live our normal lifes or just go about blogging have to rub shoulders with it and rather than have it just part of the background, and have to deal with it where it’s front and center and must pretend to go along otherwise my site get attacked, just shows how every day and what a problem this is.
It’s such a sad fact about Asia.
To further explore this issue in the New York Times
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Yan Sham-Shackleton Online 
I’m fairly new in Beijing, I just hope I won’t fall down to that 🙂 Thanks for the warning ! 🙂
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Well done, Yan, you brought up a lot of great points. I think the guys who send you nasty emails and defend themselves by posting comments haven’t really stopped to think about things from an Asian woman’s perspective. They convince themselves that they are so much more attractive than Asian men because of their personalities and their condescending pseudo-chivalry, when they are, in many cases, a last resort for a woman who needs income and security in her life (and who, ironically, has been put in that situation because of first world colonialism and hegemony). Of course I’m not dismissing all Asian-Western relationships, but you have to take a look at some of these crusty white guys you see in Hong Kong with beautiful, fit young Asian women on their arms. Think about it, guys. It’s not your sparkling personality she’s attracted to.
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You have a very unique and credible perspective, Yan. Your presentation of the issues are far, far more compelling than those who post comments defending themselves.
I suspect some of those “working girls” have very horrible, painful stories; the flip side of which is some “crusty white guy’s” fantasy. This state of things is sad and troubling.
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a chilling article in the New York Times on the same topic
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I enjoyed this post a lot. I find a lot of frustration with this issue here in Taiwan. The industry thrives very close to where I live, and it bothers me tremendously that it is a good chance many expats pursue this exploitation. I was surprised once to see an acquaintance of mine coming out of an alley with a working girl on his arm. Maybe it was because he was married to a Taiwanese girl that I just didn’t conceive of it happening, but suddenly I had to face the fact that maybe my friends were doing this. I started paying more attention, and now I find it hard to face many white men in a conversation, hearing what I just heard them say, even in jest. There are just so many westerners here with deplorable attitudes about the sex trade and exploitation of women–challenging their attitudes is the best option, but is usually met with scorn. Try to argue that they are participating in perpetuating a gendered and racialized inequality and you will get a “so what?”. I am left with 2 choices. Not talk to them, in which case I would have very few westerner friends and contacts; or realize that it is a fact about Asia and unhappily submit to it.
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im really impressed that you are speaking out as a woman, as an asian woman, as an intelligent asian woman clap clap clap
you may be interested in this site, http://www.bitchmagazine.com, as well. its a feminist magazine. you should really think of writing there!!
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can’t breathe, can’t sleep
My favourite phrases from the last few days. From Forked Tongue, yeah, I know he was taking the piss. a battle-scarred Wanchai Jedi, accomplished in the dark arts and SMS warfare From Fumier: The US$500k negative NPV annuity (commonly known…
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That was a very good piece Yan and I agree with much of what you have written on the central theme of working girls in Hong Kong.
I do spend a lot of time in Wanchai and am well known in many of the bars, not as a customer, but for want of a better phrase, as an oldish hand in that neck of the woods.
I know many of the girls that have been here for a while to talk to and by name.
I have had similar conversations with several. If anyone thinks a working girl likes what she is doing then they need a lobotomy. No matter how nice a guy is, if he is a paying customer the girl will only think of him as a paying customer even if she thinks he is a nice guy. I remember one girl saying to me that if a customer actually wanted to marry her she would always remember that she already knew he had paid for sex. Not a good start.
In the past few years the number of working girls has increased in Wanchai dramatically. First from Thailand and the Philippines and now dramatically from mainland China and Vietnam among others. Mongolia supplies a few too.
What many “customers” do not realise is that many of these girls have triad minders and are bought in in organised operations.
I know some white guys who make money going to Thailand and coming back with their “girlfriend” for a visit. I know one person who lives in Hong Kong and regularly goes to Thailand to escort girls to Japan. His payment? ticket, hotel for one night in Tokyo, a cash sum and as much use of the girl as he wants while they wait for the Japanese to come and fetch her.
No matter how much the prostitution angle is wrapped up in the “Girlfriend Experience” which marks the trade in Asia compared with the more mechanical approach in the west, it is nevertheless an appalling situation for any woman to be in. They may well as it stands have no choice but the guys who go to Wanchai for paid sex need to stop kidding themselves.
Again a good post and a worthy topic of intelligent discussion.
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I live in a country where prostitution is legal. That is, some of it is legal, some isn’t. When it was legalised part of the trade went legal and part of it went further underground. That is where the bad stuff happens. Could this be a (partial) solution for Asia?
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I personally don’t think legalizing prostitution is an answer. Regardless of whether or not a practice is legal, the fact would remain that many of those women are forced into it through desperate social and economic circumstances, or, as Phil pointed out, by men posing as their ‘boyfriends’ who traffick them across borders (BTW, excellent post, Phil). To legalize prostitution would be to take the easy way out– not only that, it would be giving a seal of approval to colonialist and misogynist behavior. The answer is far more complicated and enigmatic than simple legislation. To really resolve the problems caused by the sex trade you have to look at class structures, social systems, economic issues, and gender-specific attitudes. We shouldn’t have to change laws to allow people to treat each other as objects, we need to change the attitudes and social circumstances that make a young woman think her best bet in life is becoming a prostitute.
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Interesting and thought provoking topic. But you are right when you talk about stereotypes. Your stated views are one dimensional in the extreme. You choose to focus on the big bad white expat preying on the poor down trodden Asian woman. This is happening, but what about the vast sex trade in Mong Kok and Macau and Southern China, fuelled and perpetuated by Asian (Chinese) men preying on Asian women (including women from the same impoverished countries as inhabit the Wan Chai scene)? Please be balanced and comment on the entire picture. All of it is sleazy and wretched (and often tragic), but you seem to be choosing to concentrate only on 1% of the problem. Surely you are not suggesting that it only is worth comment – and condemnation – if it crosses a racial or cultural “boundary”?
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I am on the fence when it comes to legalisation. I am tempted to take the road that while Erika is right in principle, the real world dictates this (the world’s oldest profession) is not going anywhere in which case is it better for the girls to control it.
Singapore legalised prostitution in certain areas and as a result the girls have health checks. Okay, Singapore is small and easier to manage, but the girls are better off there than say in Hong Kong which skyrocketted the fees for AIDS tests for non-residents (most of the working girls here are not residents).
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Curious does have a point – the local sex trade (which is a lot cheaper) and the organised system of nightclubs where sex is $300 extra an hour on the hostess bill is far far far bigger than what goes on in Wanchai.
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i feel sorry for guys that can only get laid by paying for it. what a fucking depressing existence for all involved.
prostitution will never be eradicated. it is a very complex area of public policy and social discourse.
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I actually truly believe in legalization of prostitution, porn as well as drugs. It’s been pretty successful in places like Holland and Sydney, the women (let’s not call them girls ya?) have a certain level of protection. Moves the trade out of triad and other gang related control.
Prostitution will never be erradicated. But we can make it safer and healtier for those involved. As for moving certain level even more underground, with the lesser police patrol of the “whole” sex trade they can concentrate on that aspect more.
However, I do agree with the fact it’s the structral changes in the world that needs erraticating before a real difference can be achieved. However we can be practical about it for the time being.
In LA where I used to live, the trade had a much stronger element of choice, the women are willing to do this for money, some to fund their college education, while of course the sleezy element of run aways and abused girls are obviously still there. I think banning those women who have choosen to do so, is also opressing their personal life and we shouldn’t do that.
Prostitution is although personally SAD, the realities of the trade is a business, and if a place has a certain level of economical equality and it persists on an un-cocered level, it should be respected. As Phil says, the sex trade in Asia is coded under a “Girl friend” element rather than a business element for many other reasons. That I object to.
As for what curious wrote. The reason I choose to talk about the expats first is because it was very very front and center of this blog world, rather than the dilema of Chinese Men’s visit to the prostitute circuit here. That too is a problem, and very real also. Same rules apply.
The conversation was completely in context of what is being said. I was not choosing to pick at one, except there are no blogs of that kind in Hong Kong, a Chinese man writing about his sexual exploits. If so, trust me I would be saying the same thing.
I think rather than bringing the conversation wider as in, “Well it’s a problem for many people in a wider context” where I would be the first to agree, but choosing to say you disagree with the piece has more to do with ego and self preservation than the topic at hand. One can alway approach conversations as someone who brings up points or call on the writer.
However, I do agree, that the sex trade in asia is not ONLY partaken by expats in wan chai, places like mong kok, yau ma tai, kowloon tong are much of where the asian men go is also a huge problem. Except the truth is I live on the Island and in my experience is very limited to that of Wan Chai and cannot speak much from a personal perpective on that account. Which will always be the angle of this blog.
Yan
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These were posted on a different post but it’s already off the front page. So I am putting it here, because I think Tre and John should also have their say. As well it shows the response of some who cannot enter in conversation incredibly sad and not worthy of links or respect.
Yan
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Have to say nuff respect to Ms Glutter for taking a stand against the, well, paedo pervs, ’cause thats what they are. Fortunately I don’t believe they are wholly representative of the western males in HK (of whom I am one) but they are a significant minority, and quite frankly an embarrassment.
Sadly its an all too common sight in HK – Bloated, unnattractive 30 and 40 somethings such as Conrad, been in HK a few years, strutting around with a tiny filipina on their arm as if they are some kind of stud, boasting of bedding indonesian domestic helpers as if its some fantastic achievement akin to porking a Miss World, or drooling over Japanese women dressed up to look like pre-pubescent schoolgirls.
Its just plain sad. I however derive a great deal of satisfaction when I actually see pictures of these guys – Either fat, bald or ugly – In Conrad’s case, probably all three. He loves to post pictures, but never of himself. Why, I wonder.
“Chris” who posted on Jan 20 is a pretty good example of the western male superiority complex that is so visible here. All the usual slurs and cliches are dragged up. But this is a guy who thinks that staggering out of Fenwicks at 4am with a “flipper” or “little brown fucking machine” (the phrases their ilk use, not me) on his arm is proof that asian females find western males “irresistable”. How very sad.
Worst of all, these are guys who get so insecure when a western female dares to date outside her race (god forbid she even dare to date an asian male). Hypocrites one and all.
Posted by: Tre at January 26, 2004 02:47 PM
I remember a discussion with one of my woman students in Taiwan. She was quite surprised to hear that I didn’t go out getting drunk in the ‘foreigner bars’ and trying to pick up younger drunk girls from among the ‘foreigner groupies’.Apparently the Taiwanese assume (not without reason) that that is the typical behaviour for most of the western men in Taipei. For the most part I didn’t like many of people I met in those bars, or those I went to in Japan or Hong Kong. Sleezy pick-up joints are sleezy pick-up joints, no matter where they are. And I definitely agree that many of the jerks I met would have had great difficulty getting laid in their own countries because they wouldn’t have had ‘being foreign’ as an excuse for acting like an arsehole.
John
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Speaking of the attractiveness of Western men. I’ve heard that Asians consider Westerners smelly. I think because they’re supposed to sweat more. Though it could also have to do with diet (which is why we think Arabs and Africans are smelly).
Is this true? And, in general, are Western men considered attractive? Or only by these girls? What is the ideal man in Asia? Is the Western culture so dominant that it imposes its own ideals? (no nuances! we want generalisations!)
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Harald, there are 7 million people in Hong Kong alone, let alone all of Asia. It would be a miracle if anyone could agree on any one answer to any of your questions.
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Is the Western culture so dominant that it imposes its own ideals?
YES. All the time,
Other than that, I am gonna let someone else answer if they dare. I have a lot of freaks reading this site babes. They are really pedantic and therefore these conversations just leads to all out flame wars coz egos are fragile. 🙂
Yan
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Harald: I’ve heard that too. Supposed to be because of the dairy and meat element in the Western diet, but if that’s the case then Asian people better watch out. Meat consumption is on the rise in a big way and the traditional diet is out the window.
I think it’s pretty hard for Western expats in Asia to get an accurate picture, because they easily get caught in feedback loops which amplify their biases and self-justifications. You can see this from some of the reactions to Yan’s posts. Talk about hanging yourself with your own rope — these guys have no idea how they sound to anyone outside their collective circle-jerk. Jeez.
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Adrian – you are right – I find the attitudes of some westerners here embarrassing. Whether it be to learning the language, eating the food, thinking they have some special talent that means they should be the company boss, or whatever. I call it the superiority complex.
Of course not all of us are like this but it is generally assumed by people that we are (I have suffered under these assumptions and been called a dirty white man who chases after asian girls” myself which came as a bit of a shock and thus the labelling and stereotypes are maintained with equal effort by both sides of the “flame war” with equally fragile egos.
And I find it so sad.
One good thing is that things are changing. The number of fat expats on salaries and benefits far beyond their talent or worth is decreasing, the number of people of western extraction who are coming here and making a normal living on local terms is increasing (I have been one of those since 1995).
The people with biases and self justifications tend to be the ones in a certain social strata. Most ordinary westerners who feel depressed every time they pay the rent are really not that ignorant.
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I really actually can’t hold my tongue although I gave it a good try.
Phil seems to feel Glutter and Yan’s feelings towards the readers she doesn’t like, other bloggers she finds incongrulous to have to share a percieved space and community she wants no part of, and gross white guys who like girls who are poor to revolve around him.
It’s not true. None of the times he’s decided to take on and be the mouth piece for angry white men every where he even passed through my mind.
He just doesn’t but he then has to as we say in Chinese “put shit on oneself” and think it’s about him and gets all uptight and shitty about it.
Each time I think, “But I was unaware you were like that.” Maybe he is and I never knew.
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Search Item into This Post: sydney man tricked lobotomy.
Considering some of the comments I had had over this whole argument thought all three posts. I would say that’s a GREAT search into here, because although none of the people who left nasty comments were tricked into it. I would say a fair many exhibit symptoms of having had one.
Yan
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I just thought I’d post a comment since prostitution was actually legalised here (being New Zealand) about halfway through last year. The rationale behind the legislation was that it would provide protection and better safety nets for those in the profession, and that it was more sensible to be realistic about what was taking place rather than try to ignore it.
At the time I was in two minds about whether I supported the new laws or not – yes it helps those who are in the profession by choice, but it does nothing for those in slavery or who are forced into the industry. I would like to think that the horrific things described in your post and the NYT article don’t happen in my country, but I have a bad feeling that they do, although perhaps on a smaller scale.
It’s probably too early to see whether this change has actually made a difference to the industry (other than making it somewhat more mainstream than in the past), but I really hope NZ doesn’t become a target for traffickers because of it.
On another note, reading your site I think I’m beginning to gain a better understanding of why many of the Asian women I know (who have emigrated here from TW, HK, China) seem to have an innate distrust of white guys…
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“Or came here to work as maids and had a second career because their lives are so dead end and they have a huge family to support back at home that doing this with a chance for “Lucky Love,” someone who might actually fall in love with them, marry them and take them out of their lives, is worth the chance. ….
These girls might pretend they enjoy in front of their customers, these men might like to lie to themselves, but all it takes is an hour talking to these women, which I have once or twice to know how much they hate their lives, and their work and what’s going on..”
OK, so cleaning the toilets of a Chinese family for paltry wages is somehow less demeaning than sleeping w/westerners by choice??? I’m referring to those ladies that really are maids, at least by day…
“…but you have to take a look at some of these crusty white guys you see in Hong Kong with beautiful, fit young Asian women on their arms. Think about it, guys. It’s not your sparkling personality she’s attracted to.”
And how is this different than western (US) women with their “valuable” psychology and sociology degrees glomming on to dentists post graduation? I really do think it’s because they like the way he combs his mono-brow.
“ I remember one girl saying to me that if a customer actually wanted to marry her she would always remember that she already knew he had paid for sex. Not a good start.”
But on the other had, she REALLY believes that the guy will actually forget/forgive the fact that she’s had sex with hundreds of men for money?!?!? Priceless!
“Its just plain sad. I however derive a great deal of satisfaction when I actually see pictures of these guys – Either fat, bald or ugly”
Ummm….why else do you think that they’re doing it Adonis?
“I’s not always something people jump into when they move to Asia, it’s generally a progessive slide, takes a little time, and when the man is forty, it’s pretty much what happens.”
As long as there are insecure men, unattractive (both physically and financially) men, fat/frigid wives, and poor attractive women, this will continue.
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Yan, you shouldn’t be too moralistic and holier than thou when it comes to the ‘sex industry’ in HK or the rest of Asia for that matter.
Sure, there is an element of coerced prostitution which is completely reprehensible. But the sort of expat slap & tickle you talk about in Wanchai is really all & nothing really.
Expats did not create the institution of prostitution, it’s already had a long & illustrious history in Asia dating back thousands of years.
I’m a journalist and I only recently had lunch with an extremely high ranking S’pore newspaper editor who defended men’s right to take mistresses and prostitutes because of the good old biological arguement, and also because (quote) “the Emperors of China saw nothing wrong in keeping vast harems of concubines dating back thousands of years!”
It’s engrained in the social fabric here and a lot of the women (who are, let’s face it, not the best educated) do very well indeed out the industry before retiring in their 30’s with money enough to buy a house, hairdressing salon, or what have you.
One interesting perspective is that a lot of these women in the industry have absolutely NO illusions about men, and when you ask them “do you have a boyfriend?” they shake their heads in horror at such a suggestion that they should depend on a man.
Yes, you are right that many of us find it impossible to remain the sensitive, sweet & innocent young men that we all were at age 18-20. Yan, this is called LIFE and EXPERIENCE. By the time you’re 40 or so, particularly if you’ve lived many years in Asia as I’ve done, you’ve usually experienced a fair amount that’s beyond the pale.
Life is cheap in this part of the world. Expats did not create that state of affairs. It’s always been cheap. Women and their bodies have always been a transactable commodity out here.
But if soome expat green horn fresh of the plane mistakes a blow job for a long term relationship, well more fool him for being so embarrassingly naieve. Yan, it seems many of your ‘friends’ fall into that category.
One final thought to leave you with. I heard only last week that a girl I dated when I was around 20 or so in the UK was founded raped and murdered back in 2002. She had her throat slashed by a psychotic immigrant who was desperate for sex but didn’t know how to get sex in the London suburbs. He had earlier propositioned several women and they’d (rightly) told him to piss off.
Now, if you had the institution of prostitution in the UK, perhaps this sad fuck could have just gone and relieved his sexual tension, perfectly legally, without having to drag an innocent woman off the street, raping her and then brutally murdering her and leaving her to die in a field.
Yan please reflect on my comments. Grow up. Don’t be so judgemental of other people who are not so puritanical as yourself.
Have you considered moving out of HK? It does not sound the sort of place where you can be happy?
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