Hookers and Whiskey

This weekend Matt and I went to China to have dinner with the owner's and employees of a factory that Matt works with. It was a great opportunity for me to practice my Mandarin! If you ever want an ego boost, go to China...all they tell you there is how beautiful you are, how clever you are and how amazing it is that you can speak Mandarin so well. (I DON'T speak mandarin very well, but I think Chinese people are so shocked to see a white girl speaking Chinese that they think anything you say is brilliant.)

The dinner was delicious: standard Guangdong style food with lots of veggies and seafood. Delicious! After dinner we all went up to a room in the hotel to play Liar's Dice and do karaoke. When we got in there, the servers brought in a whole bunch of pitchers of whiskey (to be mixed with water...eewww!!)and plates of snack food. Then....the girls came in. A whole line of girls dressed like hookers came in and stood at the front of the room, with badges around their neck that had their number on them. All of Matt's coworkers were men, except for two women. All the men sat there and looked at the girls and picked ones from the line that they wanted. I thought the embarrassing, degrading situation was over, but then they brought out another string of girls. More of them were picked, and then another string of girls was brought in. It seemed to never end! Some of the girls were
blocking the TV that the Karaoke was on, and the men yelled for the girls to move...which seemed even worse, cause it was like the girls were SO inconsequential that they were less important than the karaoke which no one was even singing. I went to the bathroom, and when I came back, a girl was in the way of where I had been sitting with Matt...a factory worker literally pushed the girl out of my way! I felt very sad, the girls were treated like dirt.

Matt was completely used to a nd comfortable with the whole process...usually he gets a girl, which I think is yucky. He said he tried not to get the girl at first, but it was so awkward with the rest of the men that he decided he should just get one. Hmmm...then he said it was no big deal because they are just there to play Liar's Dice and sing karaoke if the men get bored. This may be true, BUT there is still the fact that the girls will have sex with you if you pay them money at the end. I was playing Liar's Dice, and the girls were really good. It was my first time so I was bad. Plus, I was wearing jeans and a t shirt, and they were dressed in tight, sparkly outfits. They were overly nice (of course) to the men, pouring their drinks, laughing at their jokes, leaning on them, cuddling with them. The whole thing was so intimate...like having a girlfriend that is your servant and who thinks that everything you say in brilliant. On girl kept picking up Matt's dice cause he was drunk and kept dropping the dice. I was like, "Don't do that. He is a drunk ass, he can pick up his own stupid dice." It is a dangerous situation: really drunk men, girls that are dressed in very revealing clothes that are really nice to you and yet desperate. The men would like, kiss the girls on the cheeks and keep their hands on their thighs. Yuck! Not that I think Matt would ever do anything...but damn, how easy can they make it?

I found myself in love with the two men that refused to get girls. This is not to say the whole night was awkward, it was fun actually, and Matt's female coworkers had no problems with it, they were high fiving the girls when they did good in the game. For some reason, this sort of "entertainment" seems a lot worse than men going to a strip club. That seems like more of a performance, less hands on. This was like girls being yor girlfriend for a night. That is a LOT WORSE! Matt said no one usually takes the girls home or to their hotel room, but frankly I don't believe that at all. We saw one of Matt's coworkers the day later and he said that after we left, the atmosphere changed alot and they brought in more girls, so he left. I was like, alright, what about the two female coworkers? They didn't seem to care, but I think they just don't know anything different.

I am all for cultural sensitivity, but there is a line, right? Just cause you know that it is a cultural norm for people to do a certain thing doesn't mean that you have to like it. BUT, that being said, we all saw Memoirs of a Geisha...it didn't bother me so much in that movie. Anyway, enough of me ranting...

Matt told me a long time ago, out of the blue, that he felt bad for expat women here because the expat men are so sleazy. Kelly's husband told her the same thing. Thank God I trust Matt so much.