doc 1999A

And if there is water in the bathtub, they'll find a way to drain it. I had thought that I was fortunate when I saw that I had a rubber drain plug that, well, worked, and that, well, couldn't be grabbed with the fingers. I had to use my knife to stab it and pop it up out of the drain. (Oh, that reminds me, bring a knife. You'll need it for the drain plug, and for the watermelon. And, also for the bigger bugs). So, initially, I had thought my water stash was safe. There wasn't a girlfriend alive that could grab that little rubber drain plug, especially if I pushed it all the way down into the drain.

I was wrong. The girlfriends, though regimented and untrainable, are resourceful. They drained my bathtub every time. How they did it, I don't know. I always hid my knife. And this was a major problem. We were losing water during the day, and with that, proper "bathroom privileges". I was at a complete loss. Telling them to keep the water in the tub just didn't do it regardless of how good the smile sex was. I had to come up with something else.

I found a dirty tee shirt, which really wasn't a problem, as that's all I really had, and threw it into the tub of water. I had found a dilemma for which the girlfriends had no conditioned response. Do they drain the tub and leave a sopping wet tee shirt in it? Of course not, then the tub doesn't look like it's supposed to. Besides, what to do with a sopping wet tee shirt? Carry it through the room to hang it outside and get all those bugs on the floor wet? It certainly didn't look clean, so it didn't belong on the line I had jury rigged outside (survival rule: hang a reliable dry line outside, and wash your clothes every day. You never know when the water will stop, and when the tub will run out). It really threw them. So every night we had water, a shirt, or a pair of socks stayed in the tub. We never ran out of water again. The girlfriends had been conquered.

Back to DengFeng. I can't remember where I was..... Oh, sex in China. The girls in the dance club. Yes, Yong had told me that that building had  a dance club in it, and he kind of left it at that. He didn't understand the term whore house, so I didn't bother explaining it. I just kind of ignored it. But my interest was piqued. As we walked around DengFeng, I decided that I wanted to investigate the crowd that had gathered around that main hall in the main square. Yong said that there was a concert going on. I wanted to go. We got there, and Yong had felt that the concert wasn't going to be that good, because he knew of the artist who was performing there. It really didn't make any difference to me; I wasn't going to understand it anyway. But right next door was a larger building, and it, again, had that figure of a girl and a guy dancing lit up in neon on top of it, in a slightly inconspicuous spot. I asked Yong about it, and he told me you can dance with the girls or get massages from  them there. I was all for it. I said we're going, and I'm paying. After a month of gong fu workout, a massage is just what the doctor ordered. Besides, the only other option for getting a massage is from the Chinese "doctor" who works at the wushu guan. He asks me every day with his very limited English. "Massage?"  "No". Besides, I think he's gay. He ain't gonna touch my back. So when this prospect opened, I was all over it.

As we entered, a policeman greeted us at the door, and escorted us in. Inside, behind a large wall of glass, were a whole bunch of nice looking girls, sitting on couches, watching television, and eating peanuts. Yong said that you could pick any of them to talk to or dance with. Since I can't talk Chinese, and I can't dance, I told him that we would just get massages and get out of there. It was getting late, and tomorrow was another day of working out. We had a lot of work to do to get through that last form. So Yong told the girl at the entrance that we wanted massages, the cop said goodbye to us, and we were escorted into the back.

We passed the sauna on the way back (Yong asked if I had wanted a sauna. As if I needed one, working out in 95 degree weather....) Way in the back were more girls, who, from what I could tell, had not seen an American before. Think of their reaction as somewhere between irresistible fascination and absolute fear. I was told to pick one, and she would massage me for forty five minutes. The cost? One hundred Yuan, about, twelve bucks. So I grabbed one, and off we went for my massage. Yong just didn't want one despite my offer to pay for it.

As far as massages go, it wasn't the best. I took my shirt off and laid on this bamboo thing. Not the most comfortable thing in the world, but a massage is a massage, and I needed it. She seemed to be a little scared of me, well, no, make it a lot scared of me. My forty five minute massage lasted fifteen. She was definitely in a rush to get out of there.  No matter, twelve bucks to have someone rub my back was worth it. She finished, and I left.

As we headed out to find a taxi, Yong asked me if I got anything special. I told him that I did. He was a bit surprised at that. Yes, to me, a fifteen minute backrub was pretty special.  He then told me that wasn't what he meant. There really isn't much of a language barrier between Yong and I, as he lived in Montreal for three years, and he spoke pretty damn good English. But he did have some trouble with the slang.

He told me that you can get special things at these places. For about three hundred Yuan, I could have had a special service. And if you're Chinese, it only costs about two hundred Yuan. I was completely lost. And then he told me, that because I was a big foreigner, I would probably have to pay five hundred Yuan. I was starting to get the picture. I thought. "You mean, you can get laid for a few hundred Yuan?" He kind of looked at me funny. "Laid? What is laid?" How do you explain that to an English speaking Chinese?

I explained to him that getting laid was having sex. He just couldn't understand the logic behind "getting laid" and "having sex". This started a whole half hour conversation about how laid means to lay down, well, no, more like, you did lay down, and, when you lay down, you have sex, so, getting laid means having sex. By the time I got through my thoroughly complete explanation, I was confused too. I had no idea why "getting laid" means "having sex". That's when he told me "getting something special" meant having sex.  He couldn't explain that one to me either.

I had no idea I was in a whore house. In the middle of DengFeng. Right smack in the middle of the town square, Next to the town civic center. And I was escorted in by a policeman. When you consider the very simple fact that prostitution is illegal here, and, prostitution where a foreigner is involved (god forbid we ruin their women), these are things that carry heavy fines. And jail sentences. I've heard of foreigners being thrown into prison and being fined anywhere from a thousand dollars to ten thousand dollars. Actually, it really did all make sense. From what I hear, the police run these little prostitution rings. And the prostitutes "inform" the police when they have a foreigner. Thirty bucks is nothing for the "special service" when the fine is in the thousands of dollars. Quite the business set up they have here.

But what really blew my mind was the fact that it was right in the middle of town, fully exposed, with all to know exactly what went on in there. For the Chinese men, it is no big deal, almost like going down to the local pizzeria to get a slice. An illegal slice, but still an easy slice. It was the last thing I expected to find in what I thought was a civil and proper China.

Of course we went back.

My last night Shaolin brought us back to DengFeng for the celebratory real chicken dinner. Chicken thighs and noodles, all while sitting in the street under a full moon. Amidst the diesel smoke and bicycles. You can't beat it. After dinner, I just wanted to go home and crash. I was absolutely exhausted. Between my three week email access problem, and threats from home of putting my dogs in a kennel, I was mentally wiped out. But Yong was finally up for his massage, and he wanted to go. We went, again greeted at the door by a policeman who smiled at us like we were old friends.

I told Yong that I would pay for it, but that I was just going to rest downstairs while he got massaged. He encouraged me to get one too, and after a while, I figured what the hell. That's when the fun began.

Going to the back to pick my massager was an experience. When I showed up, all the "irresistible curiosity" I had experienced the previous night was more replaced by "absolute terror". They wanted nothing to do with me. No eye contact, just sit there, pretend to watch the TV and hope that "he doesn't pick me". Kind of reminded me of my experiences at college dances. At first I thought that maybe I should have washed in the cold water a little better before I had left. Then it had occurred to me that these women were not just massage women, they were prostitutes too. All of them. And they did "special services". And I was a big American. Five hundred Yuan. Two hundred for a Chinese man. It all came together. No wonder why they didn't want me. They thought I was there for "special services". All I wanted was a damn massage.

Yong noticed the problem too, so he started talking to them. He went from one to the other, all, from what I could tell, giving him one kind of story or the other. No eye contact, just fear. I could sense it. I was an outcast. An outcast in a whore house no less.

The manager picked one and told her to go upstairs. I really thought that this was a bad idea now, telling Yong that I was just going to wait while he got his massage, which was my original plan. But Yong thought that would be "losing face", and you just don't "lose face" to a prostitute. Like I really cared. (As William would say, "F--- losing face. F--- all of you. Get the F--- upstairs". William had a way with words).  But I went upstairs, and when I got there, the girl the manager picked to give me the massage ran downstairs. It was kind of funny, actually. Now, Yong said, I was really "losing face".

I thought of how the IBM salesman kicked my ass at the bargaining table when we were trying to buy Yong's computer. I "lost face" there, but I really didn't care. Now a hooker was making me "lose face", and as a representative of all of the males of America, I felt a tremendous responsibility on my shoulders. I wasn't going to stand for it. I went back down stairs, pointed at the girl who gave me the shitty (but enjoyable) massage the night before, and waved her to come with me with a stern look. She wasn't all that happy. I really didn't care. At this point, I was going to get that massage. And I was going to leave here with "my face".

I got my massage, and this time, after about ten minutes, when she finally realized that there was nothing "special" in this deal, she did a good job. And my massage lasted an hour and ten minutes. When she had finished, I gave her the hundred Yuan, plus a fifty Yuan tip. She was happy, and my back was happy. I left with "my face", and the knowledge that the other girls in there were really pissed off that they lost the opportunity to make an easy hundred and fifty Yuan on just a back rub.

I finally got into a battle here in China in which I left as the victor. After all of these yearly visits learning gong fu here in China, I finally won a battle. OK, so I beat a bunch of prostitutes. But I still won. I didn't "lose face".  William would have been proud of me....

Oh, and the policeman. The policeman smiled at us as we left, slapped me on the back, and told us to come back the next night. Not only did I kick some hooker ass, but I made a friend in the police department.