Lifestyle – China vs. North America (IV): Night Life

Night life - sleepless in Shanghai, Beijing, Chongqing, Canton, Nanjing, Shenzhen, Wuhan, ...

Nanjing Road in Shanghai. On such streets, the businesses are never lack of traffic, even at midnight.

To the biggest surprise to many westerners on their first trip to China, the night life in major cities is way beyond their imagination. No matter variety or scale or content, the North American version is absolutely dwarfed. From exotic bars or tea houses to busy Karaoke places, from crowded restaurants of all sorts of styles to crazy nightclubs, from 24/7 shopping centers to late opening recreational centres, from art performances and concerts to underground entertainments, from the ones you see a lot in the West to the many you’ve never heard of, guaranteed you will feel the unbelievable energy and creativity Chinese have for their night lives. On the contrary, North American large cities leave a “countryside” first impression to many Chinese immigrants or visitors who came from the big cities.

It’s true – Chinese love night life and they spend loads of money on it. The younger generations, those who were born after the 70’s, are only crazier. To release their pressure at work or school, to make out with friends, to find a date or one-night stand, to celebrate their achievements, or to simply kill the time, they show up on the street at the hottest places and they have become the biggest group of night events goers. Yet, at the same time, the night events are important social vehicles to businessmen. After getting a bit loosen up at dinner, many business meetings would carry on to private karaoke rooms, where you can hire some “professionals” to serve every guest by singing and drinking with them (the services can go beyond those in many cases if you know what I mean), and recreational centres, where you can enjoy many games and excellent massage services (some of those places could be raunchy). Believe it or not, many deals are sealed off in such “intimate interactions”. If you search in YouTube for “Brits get rich in China”, which by the way is a very truthful production about how westerners conduct their businesses in China, you’ll see what I’m talking about in one of the episodes.

A modern karaoke room equiped with projector video system and advanced touch-screen song selection system.

Actually, in many Chinese big cities, there are two types of Karaoke places. Besides the one mentioned above, which are filled with young hot girls and smell of money, there’s another type designed for family and friends gathering. Their services focus on two things: 1) the AV system, and 2) the quality and variety of food and drinks. In some places, you can even bring in your own drinks without being billed for any surcharges. The second type, which charges by hours of room usage (a few hundred yuan per night), is typically much more affordable than the first type, which makes money from not only room charges but the extra amount of drinks and foods consumed and “inspired” by your professional accompanies. In some top-notch places (first type), one night of Karaoke party of 4 to 6 with accompanies can easily cost you anywhere from RMB6,000 (USD880) to RMB30,000 (USD4,400), tips to accompanies included, depending on what and how much you drink and eat. For any “additional services” you absolutely have to pay extra.

The well known "Pink Army" of a famous Beijing entertainment center run by someone deep rooted in the government. At guests' requirement and price tags, the selected "professionals" can provide any services from the basic singing to "special services". One of the hottest army members, after being murdered last year, was found to have over RMB100 million (USD14.7 million) on her bank account. Go figure.

Unlike some North American cities, in which alcohol is regulated and even banned in nightclubs, the large cities in China never restricted the consumption of alcoholic drinks except for driving. You can purchase alcohol anywhere in the city and you can drink it anywhere you want. However, the Chinese government is damn strict on drugs. According to the law, anyone who produces, smuggles, sells or transports 400g or more heroins will be sentenced to death. The recent news buster that the Chinese government, despite the appeal made by the British government, executed a British who was caught in Urumqi, capital of Xinjiang province, for smuggling 4kg heroin into China was a perfect example. The message was clear – don’t even think about it. If you want to get high in a pub or nightclub in China, go with alcohol, never drugs.

Prostitution was never legal in China but it’s everywhere. If you ask for “special service”, the Chinese euphemism for sexual service, in the Type I karaoke places and night clubs, 10 out of 10 you will get a positive answer. It’s a lucrative business and everyone in the loop gets a cut. In fact, prostitution has become such an open phenomenon and also a serious challenge to the public health in China that the government has to face it by sending experts to educate the service providers how to have safe sex and avoid STDs including AIDS. At the same time, the government would regularly raid the underground brothels every year to stop it from growing rampant. The action is called “sweeping off the yellow”, a color Chinese use to symbolize pornography and prostitution (for instance, an adult movie is called a yellow movie). In reality, each “sweeping” is a double-edged sword which sets back local economy a few years only because so many related businesses, such as hospitality and entertainment, would be immediately affected. Now you know how big and powerful the “special service” industry is.

Almost no exception, all the night clubs and recreation centers are backed by local government, mostly police force, one way or the other to keep trouble makers (gangs & mobs) off the ground. For foreigners who typically have no local roots (family or connection to key persons), my best advice would be – have fun but stay out of trouble. Or you could be in big trouble.

Lifestyle – China vs. North America (I)

Many folks here asked me: why do so many Chinese immigrate to Canada or US while China is growing fast and full of opportunities? That’s a very good question which might have thousands of answers from the Chinese immigrants. I cannot answer on their behalf each and every one of them, but I can categorize the main reasons as following:

• For a different lifestyle


• For a better education (many for their kids)


• For a better health care system and natural environment


• For opportunities China cannot give them


• For international experience

I’ll talk about them one by one down the line. Today let’s first start with China’s major cities and compare the lifestyles between China and North America.

The dramatic changes

In simple words, for most young and middle-aged Chinese who live in large cities, their lifestyle is much more hectic than the ones in North America. Yet, it was totally opposite if we flash back to 20 years ago.

The open and reform policy enabled China to quickly transform from socialism to capitalism (although the government insists it’s a special time frame of moving socialism forward). The changes in China were simply phenomenal in the last two decades. A large amount of private owned companies and foreign invested companies emerged and expanded like wild fire. They introduced competition into the country that used to run a planned economy with thousands of SOEs (state-owned enterprises), many of which quickly ran into bankruptcy when capitalism kicked their butt. The folks who used to go to work with a cup of tea spending hours on newspapers and gossips were forced to compete against their coworkers or laid off (in late 90’s, over 10 million people had to “xia gang”, the Chinese for being lay off). The nationwide inflation only made the life of those people more miserable. After tasting the cruelty of capitalism, the attitude of China’s work force went from one extreme to another – get or keep a job at any cost.

Today, when you visit China’s major cities, such as Beijing, Shanghai, Canton or Chongqing, you can easily feel the rhythm of life much faster than North America. Everything happens in a fast forward mode. You feel the vibrancy, and you feel the pressure, too.

The aggressiveness

In 2006, when CBC’s China Rises team returned to Toronto, one of the team leaders was interviewed in a local TV show. When asked about China’s job market, he commented: “… Chinese young people are far more aggressive than Canadians in pursuit of success…”. I had to agree with him for it’s the truth. Here’s why – actually one of the many whys.

Starting from late 90’s, China pushed forward its reform in its residential housing system, privatizing residential houses by encouraging people to buy houses with governmental subsidiary. Only since then, China’s real estate market tool off (There was no houses or apartments you can buy before the reform. Everyone lives in the state owned apartments). In merely 10 years, accompanying the fast growing economy, the housing prices in major cities such as Beijing and Shanghai have skyrocketed over 10 folds. However, the affordability went straight down.

For instance, the current average housing price in Shanghai is about RMB10,000 per square meter, which means a 100 square meter (930 sqft) apartment would cost RMB1 million. (Note: Because China’s large cities are heavily populated, e.g. 20 million in Shanghai alone, few people can afford living in a house, or “villa” in Chinese term, which costs millions in US or Canadian dollars. Most people live in high-rise condo apartments). The average annual personal income, however, is only RMB40,000. That means a double income family need 12.5 years income to pay off their home without spending a dime on food or entertainment. Here in North America, we only need 4 to 5 years. Many experts have been saying for years the real estate bubble which still hasn’t busted – that’s another hot topic in China and we’ll discuss about it later. No doubt, the housing pressure is on everyone, especially the young couples who are trying to establish their life in large cities. That’s why a recent TV program “Dwelling Narrowness” has become the best seller in China. Simply put, the young people there just cannot afford to be not aggressive, no matter at work or in business.

To be continued