Li's attitude is typical of many of the young urban middle class, whose slogan
could well be carpe diem or rather carpe noctem. Apart from Lhasa, another
popular pick-up place is Lijiang, in Yunnan province.
Of course, people don't have to travel to far-flung places for casual sex. Your
own flat would do. Less than 20 years ago, singles had little choice but to
stay with their parents. Now cohabitation, like sex before marriage, is
commonplace.
Before a split six months ago, Li lived with her photographer boyfriend for
three years but had never introduced him to her family. 'For my parents,
bringing a boyfriend home means impending marriage. I am still young. I'd like
to make a splash in my career first, and explore what life can offer.'
'The singles are not talking about marriages, and lovers aren't talking about
the future,' goes one popular saying among colleague students. And a joke
describes the pattern of 'one-week' relationships: 'On Monday, you send out
vibes. Tuesday, you express true desire. Wednesday, you hold hands. Thursday,
you sleep together. Friday, a feeling of distance sets in. Saturday, you want
out. On Sunday, you start searching again.'
Youngsters' unwillingness to settle down is causing great anxiety to the older
generation. In Zhongshan Park, a stone's throw from the Forbidden City in
Beijing, dozens of parents, armed with photographs and information about their
children, gather and search for potential partners. Some even go 'eight-minute
speed dating' on behalf of children who themselves will be chatting and
flirting on the internet.
'Today's young people are probably more sexually charged than their parents'
generation,' said Susie Huang, author of All About Susie, a collection of
essays about the love and sex lives of today's burgeoning bourgeois. It's
China's literary version of Sex and the City. 'To start with, it's now safe to
be naughty,' she said. 'Before you might have landed in a labour camp for
conducting an extramarital affair.'
But is it safe? A more tolerant social environment has led many to experiment
in uncharted waters, with mixed results. Divorce rates are climbing steadily in
major cities like Beijing and Shanghai, where one in three marriages ends in
failure. Syphilis has skyrocketed, with a 25-fold increase since the early
1990s. And extra-marital affairs are now common.
Maybe Muzi Mei, a former sex blogger, is an extreme example of today's restless
and hedonistic crowds. Her site used to attract 10 million visitors a day
before it was shut down by the government in 2003. Officials objected to her
online diary, which explicitly detailed her exploits. She was forced to resign
from her Guangzhou-based magazine as a sex columnist and now works for a
website, but still continues her man-hopping ways.
'My sex life is very interesting. Some may find it educational as well as
entertaining,' said the 29-year-old journalist over a bowl of steaming soup in
a Beijing restaurant. 'I sleep with lots of men because I don't want to be
imprisoned in one relationship,' she declared to the giggles of eavesdropping
waitresses. 'I am a free spirit.'
She is also a romantic. In her magazine she offered tips on creating the right
environment on a date and suggested playing your favourite music while making
love. There are books available too, offering step-by-step guides to dating,
from basic advice such as not spitting to sending flowers on Valentine's Day.
Kissing, something the Chinese people once saw only in foreign films, is now
part of the landscape.
A recent cover story in the national News Weekly concluded that 'China's love
life is in a stage of revelry, featuring the emphasis on sex rather than love;
on physical pleasure rather than spiritual fulfilment'.
Susie Huang thinks she knows why: 'It is a globalisation of some sort: China is
becoming more westernised. And, in some ways, more human.'
The Observer
