The nightlife in Dongguan has become less active since an anti-vice crackdown last year, as evident at this nightclub in the city. Dongguan was once a byword for prostitution, with about 250,000 sex workers in a city of just seven million people, and with establishments that have suggestive names, such as Virgin Hotel.
Some 10 per cent of Dongguan's population is said to be employed in the world's oldest profession.
Dongguan, which used to have a roaring sex industry, has been tamed by a major crackdown last year.
DONGGUAN (Guangdong) • It is 12.30am on a Sunday. At a music bar in the town of Changping in Dongguan, a bargirl eyes her surroundings as she pours another round of drinks for customers.
Only two small groups of men are there, drinking and playing dice over the bar's techno beats. Most of the tables are empty. It is another quiet night for business.
Dongguan's nightlife has been like this for the past year, says the bargirl, who goes by the name of Xiaofeng. Petite and fair, the 25-year-old is wearing a sleeveless, short, orange dress and high heels.
"I used to work at a hotel nightclub with 500 girls, but I moved to this bar after the government's sao huang operation," she says. "Life has not been the same for Dongguan since."
Sao huang literally means "sweeping yellow", a colour associated with sex in China. With about 250,000 sex workers in a city of just seven million people, Dongguan was once a byword for prostitution, which picked up together with the city's manufacturing sector in the 1990s.
Locals say that nightclubs, hotels and saunas were open fronts for sex workers who flocked here from nearby provinces, making 500 yuan (S$109) to 2,000 yuan per customer.
There are no signs outside this backstreet brothel at the heart of China's 'Sin City', just a shadowy alleyway, two metal gates and a pimp named Crow.
Inside, on the five-storey villa's ground floor, six prostitutes in fishnet tights and bright red lipstick are slumped onto a sofa, munching on noodles under the pink and blue glow of neon lights.
"The police won't trouble you," said the pimp, who was wearing a bright yellow Sweden football shirt and asked for 300 yuan (£32) for a night's entertainment.
This is Dongguan, a sprawling factory boomtown in the Pearl River Delta that boasts a population of around seven million people and a reputation as the Chinese capital of sex. For a price here, anything goes.
Estimates about the scale and reach of Dongguan's underground sex trade almost beggar belief.
A BAD NAME
In the past, whenever I tell people I'm from Dongguan, they'd give a knowing look and smile, and say, 'Yes, lovely place.' I don't want my hometown to have this kind of reputation. Many of us make an honest living.
SHOP ASSISTANT ZHOU XIAOLI, on why the crackdown is heaven sent
"Everyone was very open about it. We would entertain clients at dinner, then go to a nightclub or sauna for girls after that," says a factory manager who wanted to be known only as Mr Ma, 40. "This was standard for businessmen here."
But this ended early last year, in what turned out to be China's most sustained and widespread anti-vice crackdown in recent memory.
Shortly after Chinese New Year last year, state broadcaster CCTV aired an expose on Dongguan's sex trade, showing the flagrant parading and hawking of prostitutes.
This triggered a crackdown on China's "sin city", with police raiding massage parlours, saunas, nightclubs and hotels. More than 3,000 had their operations shut or suspended, 3,000 suspects were nabbed and 200 gangs busted. More than 30 city police officials, including former deputy mayor and head of the local public security bureau Yan Xiaokang, were sacked or suspended from their duties.
The crackdown took place amid President Xi Jinping's war against corruption and vice.
In May, a high-profile trial opened against Dongguan's "hotel king" Liang Yaohui, 48, who was once listed among China's 500 richest people and was a deputy to the National People's Congress, China's Parliament.
Forty-seven people - all stakeholders or employees at the five-star Dongguan Crown Prince Hotel - were charged with organising or facilitating prostitution, which is illegal in China.
The hotel generated close to 50 million yuan in illicit income in 2013, according to reports. Liang, the hotel's chairman, has denied the charges, as did three others. The rest pleaded guilty. Liang could face the death penalty if found guilty. A recent visit by The Straits Times found the hotel open for business, but its seven-storey sauna centre was closed, its glass entrance blocked by large potted plants.
LINGERING EFFECTS
More than a year after the crackdown, the effects are still being felt in Dongguan. Employees at nightclubs and massage parlours say the number of customers has plunged by more than half and that the authorities have not let up on checks.
"Why don't you call the police and check with them?" one massage parlour receptionist replies tersely, when asked if sexual services were still offered in Dongguan. At the Tianerhu red-light district in Changping, bright neon signs with the Chinese characters for "massage" dot the streets, but on a Saturday night there were few people to be seen.
A massage parlour that once employed up to 300 girls has had to let two-thirds go, says an employee.
At one nightclub, three customers were drinking and singing karaoke. "We no longer have any girls on our payroll, so the customers stopped coming," the manager says, adding that businesses have remained wary of the police.
At the height of its boom, it was estimated that Dong guan's sex industry generated 50 billion yuan in business, or about one-tenth of the city's revenue.
The crackdown has hit the city hard, even in sectors that are not directly related to prostitution. Mr Yu Licheng, for instance, had opened a restaurant three months before the crackdown, ploughing 500,000 yuan into the business .
Business was good initially and he could make about 50,000 yuan a month. Once the crackdown started, his earnings "practically dropped to zero".
"The girls go to salons to get their hair and nails done. They buy new clothes. They rent rooms in apartments nearby. Everyone goes out for supper at night. Businessmen throw money everywhere. So when the authorities cracked down, many people were affected," says Mr Yu, 32.
GOING UNDERGROUND
That is not to say that prostitution has been completely eradicated in Dongguan. Mr Ma, the factory manager, says it is still possible to arrange for sexual services.
"They're not allowed to openly offer services as in the past, but we have maintained contact with relevant people and we can make calls."
Sex workers have also turned to social networks like WeChat, where a search of "People Nearby" throws up women with suggestive pictures and contact details.
During a visit to a nightclub in the town of Humen in Dongguan on a Sunday night, a manager sidles up with a proposition.
"If you pay 550 yuan, you can get a drink and she'll accompany you," he says, pointing to one girl. "After that, you can do whatever you want, you negotiate."
But the scale is clearly not what it used to be, which may displease those whose business has been affected. But to locals like shop assistant Zhou Xiaoli, 27, the crackdown is heaven sent.
"In the past, whenever I tell people I'm from Dongguan, they'd give a knowing look and smile, and say, 'Yes, lovely place'," she says.
"I don't want my hometown to have this kind of reputation. Many of us make an honest living."
As with China's ongoing anti-corruption campaign, nobody knows for sure when - or even if - the crackdown in Dongguan will end. Locals see no immediate let-up.
Back at the music bar in Changping, it is 2am and a middle-aged customer beckons Xiaofeng over.
He puts his arms around her and asks for a photo. She giggles as the picture is taken, then takes a tip from him as he gets ready to leave.
"I don't make even half of what I used to," she says. "Many of my friends have left Dongguan for places like Huizhou and Shanghai. I think I'll join them soon."
Social media apps are also being used to connect supply and demand, especially China's mainstream instant messaging service WeChat. Since the women can't work at KTVs anymore, some of them instead linger around the building waiting for men to seek out their services.
By searching "People nearby" and selecting "Female only" you get a list of WeChat users in the area. Looking at their profile pictures, it doesn't take much imagination to figure out who's in business.
But using social media services is also getting increasingly difficult as China's Internet regulator is clamping down on sexual content.
Chinese media reports that the sex trade is also believed to have shifted to one-on-one home service and phone appointments and on the streets during my visit, I didn't see any sex workers.
Greater risks
More than 250,000 sex workers were estimated to have worked in Dongguan before the government took action. Critics of the raids say the new underground environment has exposed sex workers to greater risks.
"Sex workers have always been abused by the clients and the police. After the crackdown the situation is the same. They are still subject to violence from these to groups," said Ann Lee, a spokesperson for Zi Teng, a Hong Kong-based sex workers' rights group.
Human Rights Watch said in a 2013 report that sex workers in China are subject to serious abuses, including police violence, arbitrary detention and coercive HIV testing. The police often fail to investigate crimes against sex workers by clients, it said.
Global Times, a newspaper under the Chinese Communist Party mouthpiece the People's Daily, quoted people as saying the crackdown is hurting an already disadvantaged group, and raised the possibility of decriminalizing the industry, "as sexual freedom is arguably a human right."
Lee hopes one day the sex trade could become "just one normal business activity" with healthier control and regulations.
"But in China, that's just a dream. It's still too controversial," she added.
Viagra
Most of the entertainment venues closed by police last year have been allowed to reopen and stricter rules took effect in April, according to Chinese media.
The new rules include: Banning massages in private rooms with locked doors or lights turned off; identifying overnight guests to local police; and banning employees from offering services away from massage parlors.
However, local pharmacies in red light districts continue to display ads for Viagra in their shop windows, with both original and ripoffs for sale.
A pharmacist laughed when asked if there's still demand for the potency pills after the crackdown. "Yes," he said, "Especially at night time."
The raids lasted several months and their impact is still being felt more than a year later.
Empty red light districts
Indeed, at my hotel, a four-star establishment in the heart of Houjie, one of the red light districts, the massage and sauna floor still remain closed.
So are spas and KTV facilities at other hotels in the area that I visited.
On the streets, not one single "xiaojie" -- the Chinese word for miss that's also slang for prostitute -- is to be seen. In barbershops, often a front for sex services, staff seem to actually focus on customers' hair and nothing else.
Lin Jiang, a professor of public finance and taxation at Sun Yat-Sen University in Guangzhou, estimated that the raids could wipe out out 50 billion yuan ($8 billion) for businesses, including hotels, shops and restaurants. That's a tenth of Dongguan's city revenue in 2014.
He says it's impossible to know exactly what the financial losses were because officials have been too secretive.
"We can only estimate, we can't get the data to prove it."
Lin says the crackdown has caused financial pain in more ways than one. Dongguan's economy has traditionally relied on low-cost manufacturing. Efforts at growing high-end service industries and advanced manufacturing have been hampered by the high profile prostitution crackdown.
"The anti-vice campaign has hurt the city's image and this shadow won't completely disappear,"
Han, the businessman, agrees.
"We absolutely have fewer customers coming to Dongguan now than a year ago."
Police on alert after sex industry crackdown
Going underground
But even if the go-go days of Dongguan's red light district are over, it doesn't mean the sex industry has disappeared. Rather, the trade has gone underground.
Han can no longer openly take customers to KTVs or saunas for the "Dongguan standard," but there are ways of flying under the radar, he said, like having your own contacts with go-betweens and "mamasans."
Getting contacts was far from difficult, as I experienced myself.
Coming back to my hotel one night, I was approached by the lobby boy. "You like massage?" he asked with a cheeky smile.
For 1,000 yuan ($160) I was offered 90 minutes in my room with "two beautiful Chinese girls." He gave me his number.
Right before the lift doors closed, he winked at me and made a risqué hand gesture suggesting a type of sexual service.
A hotel chauffeur also offered his services. As we were driving along a busy highway, he turned back to me and said "anmo, anmo?" -- massage in Chinese -- and made suggestive gestures with his fingers. I said I'd think about it and he gave me his business card.
In less than a day, I had two local pimps at hand should their services be required.
When Han Yulai, a businessman in Dongguan, a town in southern China's manufacturing heartland, had clients in town for a factory visit or trade fairs, he would always offer them what he calls the "Dongguan standard."
In the evening, he'd take them to a KTV, a karaoke entertainment establishment often synonymous with sexual services.
There, a "mamasan" -- a name given to a woman in charge of running businesses at brothels -- would line up a dozen young women, mainly Chinese but also Japanese, Korean and -- the most expensive of all -- Russians.
"You choose one or two, sing and drink and have a bit of fun, and then go to a room upstairs for some 'business.' Not love, only business," said Han, who used a pseudonym as prostitution is illegal in China.
Today, doing that type of business is becoming increasingly difficult.
In February 2014, the government launched a crackdown on the sex trade in Dongguan, which has been dubbed China's "Sin City."
More than 2,000 hotels, saunas and massage parlors that catered to the city's migrant workers and visiting buyers were shut down, according to state media.
Thousands of people were arrested, including suspected operators and organizers of prostitution, alongside high-ranking officials and corrupt police officers. The city's vice mayor, who was also head of the city's public security bureau, Yan Xiaokang, was removed from his posts.
Between 500,000 and 800,000 people – some 10 per cent of Dongguan's migrant population – are in some way employed in the world's oldest profession, according to Hong Kong's South China Morning Post.
A staggering 300,000 sex workers – known locally as "technicians" – are thought to ply their trade in thousands of side-street massage parlours, exclusive hotels, spas and neon-lit karaoke bars.
"Many wives feel anxious whenever their husbands take business trips to Dongguan," the city's former party chief, Liu Zhigeng, admitted in 2009. "It's disgraceful."
Intent on shedding the city's image as China's capital of sleaze, authorities are now going on the offensive.
A slick new propaganda campaign seeks to recast this grimy manufacturing hub city as a picturesque cradle of culture and diversity.
"Upon coming to Dongguan, the first thing I notice is that the local people's lives are deeply rooted in traditional culture," gushes the voice-over for one PR film, reportedly produced by the Discovery Channel and aired across China. "The city has an inherent charm, warmth and an amalgamation of cultures. Everyday, the city manages to excite."
Security forces are also chipping in, trying to push prostitution off Dongguan's streets with a "sweeping yellow" crackdown on a trade that was outlawed in China following the 1949 Communist takeover.
Last month, the 'New Generation' sex market on Dongguan's outskirts became the latest red-light district to receive a visit from the local constabulary.
The outdoor market – a tatty labyrinth of concrete car garages that once served as mini-brothels – now lies abandoned. Dozens of shacks have been shuttered and Public Security Bureau seals adorn the metal doors where prostitutes once loitered.
"They closed the market last night," complained one local 'madam', a woman in her thirties wearing a red tracksuit top. "Normally, we could find you two girls for 150 yuan (£16)." Dongguan's sex trade may now be less visible than before but many thousands of sex workers still operate inside underground venues that are an open secret to those in the know.
On the second-floor of one of Dongguan's ubiquitous KTV karaoke bars, two elegantly dressed hostesses paraded dozens of girls before their visitors.
At least one appeared to be under-18.
For 300 yuan, the girls were available for a night of drunken karaoke, fuelled with beer, whiskey and Turkish cigarettes. For 1,200 yuan, guests could retreat to their hotel rooms with the girls.
"I'm married and have a 22-month-old son," said a 28-year-old KTV girl who was starting her third day at the club and gave her name as Luo. "My husband doesn't know I work here, nor do my parents." Luo said her route into prostitution had begun in the casinos of Macau where she racked up debts of nearly £80,000.
"I have no other option. I will leave this place after I earn 20,000 or 30,000 yuan and I'll probably return to the casino to try and win it back." A girl from Jiangxi province who gave her name as Tong said a friend had tricked her into swapping a job at a nearby shoe-factory for the KTV bar.
"I had no idea what business was going on here until I came," said Tong, who claimed she was 19 but appeared no older than 15 or 16.
Similar stories could be heard across town, in a roadside massage parlour, strategically located opposite a suburban zip factory. There, three girls were perched on a sofa beneath three fake pink roses that had been taped to the wall. A small television in the corner beamed CCTV images down from the second floor where "special massages" were administered.
Ling Ling, who said she was "20-ish", came to Dongguan from a village in Guizhou, China's poorest province, to work at a toy factory.
Soon, however, she decided she could make a better living out of the massage parlour. "I have no choice. I have to support my family," she said.
Another sex worker, who gave her name as Juan, said she had been forced into prostitution after her shoe factory boss eloped with the workers' wages.
"I prefer working in a shoe factory," she said. "At least there I can earn a living with my hands. Here, I have to do it with my body." Local newspapers have celebrated attempts to give Dongguan a much-needed facelift. One micro-blogger, quoted by the *Yangcheng Evening News, said the campaign was *"a slap in the face to those who bad-mouth Dongguan." But asked about their city's campaign to eradicate prostitution, the massage parlour "technicians" shrugged.
"I heard there have been crackdowns recently," said Ling Ling. "But the police haven't bothered us."
Earlier this year when the government launched a da huang, or "sweeping yellow" police crackdown against the sex trade, thousands of hotels, saunas, karaoke bars, and massage parlours in this bustling city of about seven million were shut down.
Known as China's "Sin City", prostitution once thrived unabated here with an estimated 300,000 sex workers plying their trade. But authorities in Dongguan have attempted to eradicate prostitution.
Yet, many taxi drivers here know where to find hotels that offer sex services. One such driver Dan Linchun admitted they get small tips - $8-$11 - for finding clients. Taxi drivers no longer keep business cards or fliers that list prostitution services, he said, adding quickly however that women's numbers remain on their phones.
After the crackdown, many women were forced to leave Dongguan. While the move has thwarted prostitution, the practice hasn't completely ended.
"Now, instead of going to a massage parlour and getting what you need there, you have to get a room in a hotel first and then call a girl," Dan said.
Most of the sex workers are migrants in search of better paying jobs. Some work at factories during the day and as call girls at night.
All aspects of sex work are illegal in China and the punishment for being involved in sexual services is 10 to 15 days of administrative detention, or a fine of up to $800.
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