M and T are two Beijing prostitutes whose services I occasionally employ. Both are over 30, T probably 40 or so, and both are independent operators.

I met M while leaving a bar at about 1 am and she hailed me asking if I wanted a “massage.” Impulsively, I said, maybe, yes, but let’s talk first.
I liked her because she didn’t look like a hooker.
She was conservatively dressed, almost preppie, with simple makeup. One thing led to another, a deal was struck but then and since it hasn’t really been about sex.

Far from it. Frankly, M and I are thoroughly mediocre in bed except when it comes to sleeping and talking. I wind up paying her mostly to literally sleep with me and that’s all right.

Hard to understand, perhaps, but especially as one ages there’s sometimes more comfort than an orgasm in reaching out during the night to hold a warm hand that presses back or to cup a breast that otherwise might not be there and then falling off again into dark bliss; an intangible comfort. Only the lonely, as Roy Orbison sang.

M says she is from an upper class BJ family, her father is a retired doctor with a major hospital and university and mother who, from M’s description seems cool but suffering from early short term memory loss.

A model of filial piety, M goes to their home every Sunday; once with a stove hood fan that I bought in lieu of services rendered, though part of me, the logical part, wondered where is daddy, the celebrated doctor in all this?

Am I being used? Sure, but I can afford it and if a stove fan makes her look like a dutiful daughter and keeps her mother from burning down the house, cool.

Carnal foreign aid, as it were.

M lives with a roommate who also works the bars, and until recently was also working part time as an accountant and beyond that I’m not sure why she continues to do what she does.

She likes sex, she says, but usually solo and about twice a week that way. It’s mostly about the money and maybe some Freudian thing regarding a lying Chinese boyfriend who broke her heart after a long time, but whom M occasionally can’t help telling me about.

I don’t pry beyond that, and really to hear her talk about the day she won the “second best 17-year-old Chinese girl chess player in Beijing” prize.
I’m proud to be with her at that moment, imagining.

She’s a news junkie and watching Chinese language CCTV news as I write this. Her English isn’t great. M speaks exclusively in present tense but the feeling is there. “BrazIL” she informs me gravely, emphasizing the “I” and “L.” “Much trouble.” The screen shows trouble in Brazil. “Africa,” she reports again. “More trouble. Korea, always trouble. Too much trouble in world.”

Now she wants to play Celion Dion on my computer. I’ve gotta stop writing for that, though I loathe Celion Dion, whose image, much less voice, is too much trouble in my world.

But it’s okay. I respect M. It’s worth Celion Dion and what I pay to reach out to hold M and hear her sigh and snuggle at 3am when the rest of my world seems to be crashing down.

Labels: beijing hookers, chinese prostitutes, life in china, lonely in china

  ¶ 7:06 AM

  Revolution
A story I recently wrote on the Chinese swinging scene, or at least a slice of it. And yes, first-hand participation ensued though that was not chronicled for publication..
``Will you help me to practice my English?''
It's not an uncommon question for a foreigner in China to field from strangers on trains, planes, buses, sidewalks, in stores and cafes. The urge for Chinese men, women, children alike to learn better English, even randomly and at inopportune moments, is strong.
In this case the question came from a topless middle-aged woman in the midst of a mostly Chinese partner swapping party in Dongguan, Guangdong province. To budding English language student's left, along a 20-foot mirrored wall and on four large mattresses strewen with condom wrappers, tissues, clothes and underwear about 20 others were engaged in a, well, the correct world is ``orgy.''
In the dim light one could not clearly distinguish men from women. Others taking a break came and went from the room's one constantly running shower, some wrapped in towels, others nude, talking, joking and generally making as if the main event they'd just exited was nothing more than an leisurely evening at a bath house or the gym.
The would-be tutor pointed to the writhing mass of flesh and tried to speak clearly above the sounds of joy and exertion.
``That,'' he said. ``That is an orgy. O. r. g. y.''
Though it survives and apparently prospers, partner swapping is more or less passe in the west, having peaked as a shocking and titillating sexual/socio phenomemena in the late '60s and through much of the '70s before harsh realities such as AIDS, combined with a socio-political swing to the right morphed key swapping parties, publications such as Screw magazine and now near-forgotten mainstream flicks such as to fBob & Carol & Ted & Alice more or less into the underbelly of the Internet and amateur porn.
But in China, while the sexual revolution hasn't exactly replaced or gained the noteriety of the Cultural Revolution, it's humming on the underground via coded missives on the closely monitered Internet and on the almost as closely observed mobile phone Q-Q system.
Not surprisingly, official People's Republic of China statistics regarding couple swapping clubs or average number of sexual partners in a lifetime weren't available, however according to the 2005 Durex Global Sex Survey of 317,000 people in 41 countries, China is No. 40 with 3.1. (India is last at 3 partners while Turks are tops with 14.5).
Internet notice of this affair, hosted by an expat German furniture manufacturing baron I'll call ``Albert'' and his Chinese wife, ``April,'' was in (slightly mangled) English and (presumably more literate) Chinese. The English version read:
``Dear Friends,
``We have the pleasure to invite you at the Spring Naughty Party on Saturday March 25th.
``The party will take place at April & Albert's home : big/warm/comfortable house, heated swimming pool, hot bubbles tub, and a fully fitted Fun room for those who are looking for more fun!
``There will be around 25-30 people: balanced number between Ladies & Gentleman will be respected to make everyone comfortable. Only good level people, respectful, not pushy, clean and easy going. There will be some old friends and several newcomers too. Lots of fun: fun, laugh, jokes, talks, and more. People will be coming from different locations: Hong Kong, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Dongguan, Shanghai, all professionals which means that everyone always ensure and guarantee a full discretion.
``Of course, everyone will do as he/she wants: only watch, stay in couple, watch and play, only play, it's up to you, just so that everyone respects the other guests freedom.
``As usual, we will gather around 8:00 pm at April and Albert's house. Then we'll go to the restaurant near by to have a dinner all together : chat, brake the ice, know each other better, warming-up.
``Our home is in Dongguan ... spend the night, no problem! We'll provide mattress for the guest who want to stay at April and Albert's home or you can you can stay at hotel just in front their home. We are looking forward to see you guys at that wonderful party!!!
``Cheers!
``April and Albert your `Naughty Party' hosts''
Though it's not technically against the law, Chinese group sex -- unless 400 Japanese clients and 500 Chinese hookers are involved and it turns into a brief international incident as it did in September 2003 during an anniversary weekend of The Rape of Nanjing at a Zhuhai hotel -- wobbles along a shifting, shadowy legal and sociological line.
According to China Daiyf: ``in the early 1980s, when in one case of wife swapping, the person who masterminded a game involving four couples was sentenced to death.''
More recently, in 2003 police broke up a menage a trois (the gender ratio was not specified) in a Shenyang hotel but were forced to free the trio after being unable to decide whether they had the personal freedom as consenting adults to mix and match or whether they should be charged with lewd behavior.
Mainland ``experts'' seem to equally divided. Some say it's perverted, while others say it's to be expected as China continues to unwind.
Jia Xiaoming, a Beijing psychologist told China Daily that wife-swapping comes from ``an abnormal mentality and a mind of chaos'' while Zhu Jianjun, another Beijing psychology professor, said that swinging is the natural aftermath of eras of sexual repression. As long as they do not hurt others, ``we should ignore it,'' he said, because eventually the pendulum will swing back to normal.
As it happens, ``Mr Liu,'' a married Guangzhou mid-level bureaucrat who brought his mistress to Albert and April's naughty party said he was one of eight ``normal'' people busted in a Guangzhou hotel, briefly detained and then freed after an interrupted orgy in 2004.
``They didn't know what to do with us,'' he said as he watched his girlfriend pair off with two other men wrapped in white towels. ``We also paid some money. But we still must be very careful.''
Orgy organizer Albert was more than aware of this. His cavernous, garishly decorated 2-story home - imagine a cross between an Albanian film about Marie Antoinette and Gone with the Wind's Tara -- nestled in a gate-guarded community has hosted four previous sexual extravaganzas, all with no incidents other than misplaced underwear, he said.
``There is no need for the neighbors to know,'' he said. ``And we are cautious about who we invite.''
While most of the couples were Chinese, there were also international duos such as the hosts, as well as an Italian woman and her Belgian boyfriend, the latter who nursed a bad head cold while his mate chose to care for him between stints upstairs to watch the action.
It began somewhat awkwardly. Cold weather and plumbing problems had the pool and hot tub out of commission and the swingers, dressed mostly as if they'd just arrived from their various government bureaus, banks or accounting firms chatted, drank wine and soft drinks and eyed one another as a large screen TV played a seemingly endless European porno disc with the volume off. Then Leo arrived, wife (Mei-mei) and mistress (Chu-chu) in tow and toting two large cartons of condoms _ one Chinese and one American.
A brief cheer and flurry of greetings followed.
``He's the king!'' quipped a Chinese man, who'd come as a single. ``I don't have a girlfriend and wouldn't have one who would come to one of these, but I like the sex too much. Like a thirsty man likes water.''
Leo was the acknowledged head of a Shenzhen-based swingers' group and something of a legend, if not for his sexual prowess but more for an income that allowed him flaunt a wife, mistress, and a BMW and his skills in organizing other get-togethers. Leo claimed later that there are smaller gatherings ``seven days a week'' in Shenzhen and Guangzhou.
He ripped open the condom cartons with a flourish and then produced a deck of pre-sorted playing cards. While matching couples with car keys is the time-honored Western method to start the swinging sexual ignition, not everyone had car keys so Leo's dating service paired couples with the same cards.
``Who has a nine?'' squealed one Chinese woman. ``Me, I hope,'' said a Canadian man, Ian, who groaned softly when he saw his queen was matched by a slightly stout Chinese woman who looked expecatant. ``Can we draw again, perhaps?'' he whispered to an onlooker.
There were similar reactions, some embarrassed, others plainly anxious or nervous and while Leo encouraged the potential hookups, all but one couple discarded their cards in favor of more wine, spontaneous mutual chemistry or past experience.
Ian was one of those. Breaking with the swinging cliche Ian chose monogamy with his long-time Chinese girlfriend, and after an passionate public display of affection, the pair made a Canadian-Sino merger on a long leather living room couch even as guests were still arriving.
A group gathered around them, some shouting encouragement in a mixture of Chinese and English while others, inspired by the enthusiastic display of international diplomacy, hurried upstairs to the mattresses to forge their own alliances.
Chu-chu - Leo's mistress - eventually became another focal point of sorts as the evening heated up and she easily exceeded the Durex 3.1 Chinese partners per lifetime statistic. At one point she rose from a pile of mostly men with whom she'd exchanged favors, raising her arms and exclaimed happily and loudly in Chinese.
``What did she say?'' the foreigner asked the woman who'd requested impromptu English lessons.
``She said she (climaxed) five times,'' the woman replied. ``Very lucky, I think.''
``You could also say that Chu-chu pulled a train,'' he replied slowly. ``Pulled a train. Chu-chu. Get it? I guess not ...''  ¶ 7:09 PM

  Wild Night
I've got a new best friend in Hong Kong, an expat New Yorker, Spike, whom I met via mutual blog and musical interests. We're about the same age, each have two busted marriages to a Jew and an Asian, have a penchant for using song titles to lead off our blogs -- but I've never driven Bruce Springsteen in a cab or jammed with Mike Bloomfield.
We met in person for the first time Saturday night in Wan Chai which, as fate would have it, was jammed wall-to-street with blotto Eurotrashitas here for something called "The Rugby Sevens." As such, many were bedecked in garish Afro wigs, pink and purple donkey and rabbit ears, face paint, horse head hats, purple sequined vests and other garb that made rabid NFL fans look like a Presbyterian deacons.
Imagine a combination of Mardi Gras and a Balkan fraternity party and you're edging close. Throw in hookers from virtually every Asian nation save perhaps Japan, and some Russian floozies and you have the proverbial cosmic ball of confusion.
On his blog http://laowai.blogspot.com/ Spike aptly described a slice of the scene: "I especially enjoyed listening to some drunk Euro fool trying to convince a hardboiled Thai bar girl that "if you like me, then you should just want to go and be with me for tonight for no money." I didn't hang around long enough for the rest of the conversation because I had no difficulty imagining it. Her telling him how much she likes him, how much she wants to be with him, blah blah blah, but she has no money, maybe she has a baby to care for or a mother with cancer or the village water buffalo died.
"It had yet to dawn on the fool that he was talking with the proprietress of a small business, and I was thinking about asking him what he did for a living and would he render his services for free to anyone who asked and added "oh, don't charge me any money because I like you so much?" Does this sound harsh? Come on. This guy has enough money to fly halfway around the world to watch a goddamned sporting event and is stupid enough to think some girl coming from a place of extreme poverty he just met an hour ago and who knows he will be gone forever in a day is in love with him. If there was any justice in the world she would turn out to be a lady-boy."
As for me, at that point I was probably was deeply immersed in pidgin Korean-English conversation with a Korean small business proprietress courtesy of Spike's introductions. He seemed to either have carnal or second-hand such knowledge of most of the women in the assorted bars and "May" was no exception. Amid all the hot pants, push-up bras and bared torsos, she stood out simply for her conservative attire. Red emo glasses, a simple white cotton blouse, blue jeans and a spiffy pair of Chucks, all set off with a generous wash of jet-ink hair.
Suffice to say that we went back to my place where I all-too-briefly realized my fantasy of being "seduced" by someone who looked like a foreign exchange English lit major.
"Okay, now you're Molly Bloom, except you're a Korean Molly Bloom. So here goes, okay? Now keep your glasses on while I.... 'Oh yes, I kissed her on the wet lush rolling heaving lambent...yes? ...grass! And she kissed and lap kissed me yes and my pumping heart pounded pounded yes perfume releasing temples throbbing yes oh yes...I will yes...yes yes."
I also said "yes" for "extra taxi money." May promptly took the offered HK$100 and bolted, not for a cab stand but to the less-costly subway before it closed. Innocent looks or not, she had balls, er, at least some brass ovaries and I admire that in a woman.  ¶ 3:39 AM

  A Man Needs a Maid in a Leopard Skin Pillbox Hat
Chinese New Year's Day, February 9, began on a rather rocky note, with a hangover thanks to too much Lunar New Year's Eve fun at a bar with a great jukebox called The Globe and a music- and beer-loving English coworker, Steve. But after rising from the ashes of Steve's place at 11 am where I'd crashed -- convienently located in HK's premier sleaze center, Wan Chai -- I passed a bar on the way to the subway called Old China Hand. As the New Year's Day scene in downtown Hong Kong was pretty much like any other New Year's Day western or Asian and deader than a used condom, I was happy to see OCH was open for business and decided that a cholest- 'o-fest breakfast might help ease the pain.
While sipping a double hair of the dog and waiting for the omniscent "British style breakfast" served here (sausages, bacon, baked beans, toast, broiled tomato and eggs) I began eyeing two comely Asian lasses in full hooker regalia at the bar. One in particular caught my eye. She was wearing an honest to god leopard skin pillbox hat atop generously pushed up cleavage, a tweed mini-skirt, black lace stockings and calf-high 4-inch pointy toe black boots. And she was viewing the world through blue, wraparound shades. Dylan and Bono together at last on a single goddess.
The women had been entertaining pretty much anyone who sidled up and seemed to be regulars. I'm not one and was just amused at their interplay, especially with a portly, older English guy who was apparently still going full-steam after a night of ringing it in.
"Why are you sitting all alone?" my new best friend called to me as I soaked up bean juice with my toast. "Join us! It's New Year's Day and I hate to see a man sitting all alone." He bought me another one and introduced himself as "Tony, retired," and then introduced me to the ladies, who were Thai.
"Your job?" asked Leopard Skin Pillbox Hat, who turned out to go by the name of what sounded like "Mesa'' to me.
I told her and she beamed. "Me too! I take picture - boom, boom! News!" She produced a mostly Thai script business card that indeed identified someone named "Praiwan Meungma" who worked for "Eagle New Press, Politics, Business, Entertainment."
It occurred to me that she actually might be a real photographer but she just laughed. "I think you know." Yes, she was one of the hundreds of Thai (and Filipinas) women who come to Hong Kong for a month at a time on bogus work or entertainment visas and then collect as much cash as they can before returning home, turning around and returning to turn the tricks again.
Suffice to say after more hospitality from Tony and with Mesa's encouragement she and I hit the hard reality of noon glare and repaired promptly to an ATM, where, as I withdrew taxi money and the previously negotiated "photographer's fee" for the camera-free Mesa, she squealed wth delight at another ATM.
She'd found HK$1,000 (almost US$130) that a previous user had forgotten to withdraw from the slot. Happy New Year indeed.
"You are lucky for me!" she beamed. But not lucky enough to knock down her fee, I'm afraid.
Nonetheless we repaired to my apartment where she hit the sheets as I showered, brushed and shaved to get rid of the New Year's Eve scunge that seemed to thinly coat my skin and teeth. Freshened up, I entered the bedroom to find the leopard skin pillbox hat on the nightstand with the blue shades and Mesa zonked out, sprawled gracefully minus skirt and panties and with her black bra partially undone. Feeling tender, I covered her and then snuggled alongside in approximate spooning mode. Weary, too, I slept the sleep of the dead while cupping a breast and was awakened with the feel of her hair on my thighs and her mouth working greedily between them as her right hand was slowly working itself between her legs.
Yowzah. Happy New Year, yet again. "Come," she said, gasping just a little between generous oral applications, her right hand still moving back and forth. "Tell me. I like to watch." It spun me back about 25 years to a lover I'd had during the breakup of my first marriage. She liked to watch, too, and her eyes would roll back until only the whites showed as she did.
"Now!"
She switched to vigorous manual mode, her right hand quickend also while she focused intently at the result. Her eyes didn't roll back, though mine almost did and she was obviously pleased with the results of her labors.
"Now my turn," she said. "Kiss me there too for a long time." I complied and in a short time she'd pulled the blanket over her head and was yelling and sobbing real tears.
I was briefly shocked, but recalled another ex who'd once cried after coming. Two old flames and her in one bed in one day. We snuggled and she assured me it was "okay, okay, too much good, too good."
I gave her a bathrobe, fresh towel and as she drew a hot bath for herself Mesa surveyed the mess that is my apartment with some dismay.
"You no have cleaning lady?" I confessed as much. "Mai pen rai," she said in Thai, which means "never mind." She grabbed a broom and dust scoop and began energetically cleaning up wrapped in the towel and robe.
"You sit down, please."
I did, though basic decency had me trailing her with the dust scoop until she shooed me away again.
After sweeping up, Mesa bathed, took her fee, donned the rock star gear, kissed and thanked me and told me she didn't have a cell phone but left the apartment a cleaner place amd me with some new memories. I cranked up the appropriate Bob and Neil songs and lounged in an afterglow that felt very good for a long time.  ¶ 4:46 AM

  S. Campbell of Fort Worth, Texas writes SZ Zen alternate mix: "Dude, it's been November since Alternate Mix served up some spicy Chinese fare. What gives?"
Mr. Campbell, Thank you for writing. At SZ Zen alternate mix we pride ourselves on customer service and we apologize for the delay. In this case, ask and you shall receive.

Good Vibrations
I didn't set out to become Shenzhen's Rabbit vibrator missionary, it just kind of happened and I owe it all to Sex and the City.
The legendary Rabbit vibrator was a guest star of sorts in season 1, episode 9 "The Turtle and the Hare" that my girlfriend, C, and I watched on her bootleg DVD SatC six season collection. The show - which I'd never viewed until coming to China - seems to be enormously popular here, especially among reasonably affluent, educated single Chinese female 20/early30somethings who yearn for lives, shoes, apartments and clothes just like Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte and Miranda. And as it turns out vibrators like the Rabbit, too. Here's part of the episode plot description: "Miranda introduces Charlotte to a very special vibrator called 'The Rabbit,' which turns Charlotte into a recluse."
C was quite curious about it and asked why it was called a Rabbit. While not detailing how I knew (previous US relationship) I explained that it was designed by those crafty inventive, kinky Japanese. It includes a basic shaft and a special clit stimulator in the shape of a cute little bunny. The bunny's ears wiggle frantically and voila!
She was intrigued and I said I'd heard of sex shop in Shenzhen that might carry them. In order to find it, though, I had to ask a coworker at The Standard, a cheerful English lesbian who speaks fluent Chinese, hangs in Shenzhen often and loves to talk about having sex with women. We have some great conversations.
After a few false starts and misdirections, and some additional help from my pal James The Temple Guy who, as it happens, lives about two blocks from the shop, I found it next to a large KFC. Inside the lone female clerk seemed a trifle startled at seeing a foreign barbarian male browsing through the assorted phallic, multi-colored toys, which were tastefully displayed like museum pieces on glass shelves spot-lit by mini-beams. She spoke no English and I didn't know the Chinese word for "rabbit" but after about 5 minutes I spotted a pink model ("The Love Bunny!") that appeared to be a serviceable and affordable knockoff of the original which - according to my Internet browsing - retails for about US$80-$120 US. This one cost about US$15. Good saleswoman that she was, she also tried to interest me in several other products, including lube, electric ben-wah balls, a beaded pull cord and a mini-vibrator as well as extra batteries. About the only thing she didn't try to sell me was a warranty, but I left only with what I'd come for.
Suffice to say C was delighted and has not become a recluse. We've used it together, over the phone and she says she enjoys it solo, though not as much as "when we touch together." "Feeding the rabbit" has become a code phrase in the Shenzhen Love Shack and it's one fat bunny.
She spread the Good Word to a single girlfriend and coworker who was also curious. And I was off once more to the sex shop because "it would be shameful for a woman to be seen in there." The saleswoman did not appear shamed to be seen selling another one, though I think she was wondering why I needed it.
A week or so passed and C told me that her friend was ecstatic and had also told another friend and, by the way....would I, could I?
By this time I began to feel like a missionary in pre-revolutionary China who'd suddenly struck gold passing out Bibles and spiritual tracts. Another trip to the Randy Rabbit Hutch and this time the beaming clerk was reaching for a fresh Wascally Wabbit almost before I'd cleared the doorway.
No further requests have been immediately forthcoming, but I'm immensely pleased to have been the Lord's instrument to further spread western decadence and pleasure throughout the People's Republic.  ¶ 2:35 AM

  Two Trains Running
Two different Hong Kong women. One is a 26-year-old former quality control inspector-turned-hooker, Wendy, who gave me a Tupperware box of home-made spaghetti to reheat later when I paid a visit to her "office" (as she calls it) on my birthday. I call her my therapist because I see her about once a week. At HK$400 (about US$50) a visit, she's cheaper than a real life therapist and more engaging. She won me over the second time I made an office call when she removed her black bra and put the cups over her eyes and exclaimed: "Look! I'm a cat!" and next put them on top of her head so they poked up like rodent ears. "Now I'm a mouse!"
She lives with an older sister who is a theology student at a local university. Her sister has no idea of Wendy's real job and thinks she works as a secretary. Wendy wears sensible office wear to her Mong Kok whore house, where she changes into something more slinky. Laundry is troublesome, she says, because her sister would wonder where the mini-skirt and plunging top came from and why.
Before and after sex she tells me about life inside and outside the office, including other clients such as a rich, kinky Chinese john who paid an enormous sum to cover another hooker from face to belly in hickeys. She went home in a surgical mask in the dark and didn't return for six weeks. Wendy shuddered telling me about it but she always perks up quickly.
She enjoys imitating Arnold Schwarzenegger and giggles when I depart with the worst Terminator "I'll be bahhck" line. Her favorite movies are the Terminator series.
The other woman has the unlikely Hong Kong name of Savannah, given to her by an older sister she says. She's a 42-year-old divorcee with a 21-year-old daughter in college in Canada and her favorite movies are Lord of the Rings and a 1997 version of Anna Karenina, with whom she strongly identifies. Savannah is a self-proclaimed "very spoiled" HK Chinese native, now Canadian citizen and a CPA. She jets between Vancouver and Hong Kong regularly and lives on the 23rd floor of a furnished service apartment in Central - a posh, bustling area that reeks of cash and privilege. Her money seems to come from her mother, her accounting work (she claims to have worked for fashion designer Vera Wang) and her Japanese ex.
I met her at a bar favored by HK liberals, artists, gays, lesbians, beats, and a local "radical activist lawmaker" (as the papers refer to him) nicknamed "Long Hair". She embodies the notion of liberal chic - supporting all the right democracy causes, but treats the underpaid help at her apartment with almost dismissive disdain.
While Wendy imitates Ahnald and plays creature feature with her bra, Savannah lounges beside me asking things like "What would you think if I told you I am someone's mistress?" or "What if I told you I have many lovers? Would you be shocked?"
Not really, I tell her, not rising to the bait. She's visibly disappointed, as am I when after she unbuttons a button on an expensive white silk blouse for a peek of cleavage and says: "Very revealing, don't you think?" she follows up by refusing to kiss.
"Too dirty, not sanitary," she says, leading me to the bedroom, where - at her insistence - we shower before - and after - doing the do. In bed she still won't kiss, though she begs me to nibble and suck her ears while she moans and thrashes and then pauses to wipe them off with Kleenex. "Not sanitary."
We approximate love making until she approximates an orgasm and I leave her.
"I am returning to Canada and won't be back for two months. Will you be sad? Will you write me love poems?" Savannah asks.
"Not unless you throw yourself under a train," I reply deadpan, thinking of Anna Karenina's ending. "And then maybe I'd think about it."
She's not sure if I'm kidding or not and it's better to leave her that way.
  ¶ 4:02 AM

  Hearts of Darkness
I'm slowly discovering the seamier side of Hong Kong, though that's a little like saying one has discovered that gambling seems to be popular in Las Vegas. Then again, it depends on your neighborhood. Just as I've met several native Las Vegans (Vegasites? Las Vegers?) who swear they've never set foot inside a casino and encountered The Strip only when a traffic route made it necessary, the neighborhoods I'm living and working in are far removed from the hustle of areas like Wan Chai and Mong Kok, where I spent some of last Friday morning and very early Saturday morning.
Friday morning I awoke in the grips of a classic hangover-horndog feeling brought on by too many solo sakis the night before. It was too early for lunch and I was too tired to sleep. So on a complete whim inspired by getting on the wrong shuttle bus from work and winding up kilometers out of my way in Mong Kok several nights before (where I had spied more than a few garish posters of fetching women outside of neon festooned doorways) I decided to return to the scene to see about relieving part of my double H feeling.
A 20-minute subway ride dumped me in the middle of Mong Kok where I wandered more or less aimlessly until spying several similar establishments all sporting signs in Chinese with thinly clad pouting women and narrow stairways that led up at least two and sometimes three levels from the street. I picked one at random, took a breath and climbed up the stairs into what looked like a dark small bar.
An elderly, portly smiling woman asked cheerfully if I was there to "make love." No B.S. about it or her. I liked the straightfoward approach, agreed with her diagnosis whereupon she escorted me into a smaller, darker room where I almost sat down on a trash can because I couldn't see the chair. She told me the fee ($HK300) for one hour and that she would bring "a pretty girl" but if I didn't like her I could ask for another.
Again, she was upfront, cheerful and polite. No overt hustle, no apparent hassle. I agreed to her terms, but because I hate rejection or rejecting anyone, was pretty sure unless whoever she directed into the darkness was on four legs and growling, I would take what I was offered.
"Jennifer" didn't disappoint. Actually, it was only after we'd made a brief introduction in the dark and I was escorted by the mamasan up another flight of stairs to the "hotel" where I paid another $60HK for a "room" that I finally saw her face clearly. She was young, reasonably articulate and not a little charming.
"Why are you here?" she asked before we got down to business."Do you have a broken heart? Or are you just horny?"
I confessed to the latter and still a little shy went into my reporter mode. I learned that Jennifer had been working there for about 7 months after she'd quit a quality control job at a textile factory, that she'd "cried - oh, a lot!" after her first four or five clients, had done "two or three foreigners" including an Italian who had "beautiful eye hairs" (eyelashes - "so long, like a picture!') and whose businessman father/boss made his life miserable.
Tiring of the Italian-with-the-beautiful-eye-hairs paternal problems, I subtly suggested we relieve my own and we took the shower before retiring to the "bed" - actually a long wide shelf, not unlike the one in my apartment but with a better mattress, more room and mirrors on one wall and one end.
She was giving and seemed to genuinely enjoy receiving and capped it off by taking me unasked in her mouth until it was over. The condom lay unwrapped beside my head. We took one another's cell phone numbers, she told me her schedule (9:30 am-8:30 pm 6 days/wk, Sunday's off) and we parted company with a kiss.
That night the shift ended mercifully early and I accepted the invitation of two senior editors to hit another area, Wan Chai - the site of my "Amazing Grace" encounter. Praying I wouldn't run into her/him we repaired to one bar that I'd seen previously described on a local chat site as "a hole where only a bunch of old, fat expat losers hang". Judging from most of our fellow patrons, that description did not seem to be entirely incorrect and after a couple double bourbons and some beer we hit another bar called Fenwicks that one of my hosts described as "the heart of darkness."
Indeed. It was crammed, jammed and sweaty with expats, both losers and winners, and some of the most amazingly beautiful Filipinas I'd ever seen - most dressed (or undressed) to the proverbial nines.
Both of my companions have had some experience, marital and otherwise with Filipinas and I asked for a summary.
"Are they all hookers?" I gaped.
"No, Most aren't," was the reply.
"So...so...what does one do? Like, what's the usual protocol?"
They laughed.
"You pick one up, buy her a drink or two and take her home. Then she'll want to be your maid or cook and eventually your wife. But that's only after a week or so."
Sounded reasonably simple, except for the"wife" part. Eye contact wasn't hard and we quickly went from a trio to a sextet. I was with "Julia". Two J-names in one day. I was on a run and her English was good, her cleavage first rate and she looked a little like Imelda Marcos in her circa 1966-boinking-George Hamilton prime. I bought her a couple drinks, danced to Mustang Sally and Play That Funky Music White Boy among other chestnuts from a Filipino band and then she put the press on.
"You need a maid? I can cook for you, too," she shouted brightly over the music and bar din. I demurred.
"Surely, you're more than a maid or cook," I shouted back."You're a complete, lovely human being! Not just a domestic!"
"I need a visa! I cannot return to Manilla to live!" Then she described only what could be called a social and economic and domestic hell hole, all the while thrusting her cleavage and shooting her chocolate brown eye lasers straight to my heart and groin.
Suffice to say, I was too polite to completely blow her off and lacked the drunken duplicity to lead her on and back into my miserable shelf bed in hopes of a quickie with Imelda. Like Jennifer before her, though, we exchanged phone numbers, she slipped me a little tongue and whispered something breathy in what I think was Tagalog before we parted.
In the words of Gen. Douglas MacArthur: "I may return."
  ¶ 5:20 AM