It suddenly came upon me that I need to blog about this, if only to remember for myself. It was on the few nights leading to Halloween.
Thu: Realized that I have 3 papers due next week (I gave up doing one in the end), came back home to have my roomie unload her stress upon me, felt like bursting with stress, and went to chiong with friends. Check out FB for photos. I think my friend has tagged me.
Fri: I think this was the actual Halloween night. Anyway, I was there early with Huiwen. The club was called Circle, and when we arrived, we realized that it was a Korean club. It was as if somebody plucked us up from the streets of NYC and dropped us into Seoul.
As I was only 11pm plus, we were simply chilling near the bar with my glass of overpriced screwdriver. Of all things, a waiter came and told us to follow him upstairs. We were confused but thought, 'What the heck?! Maybe he found us a seat.' Turns out he was simply pimping us out to 3 guys who had opened a bottle. When I asked one of the (of course Korean) guy what this was all about, he simply said that the waiter was a kind person. Personally, I think the waiter was simply a person hoping for tips. And heck, I should receive a cut out of his tip.
Basically, we were dropped into a socially awkward situation. The poor guys couldn't even muster a semblance of a conversation. Our 'pimp' came and promptly moved us to our next 老板's table. Goodness!! I have never felt so cheap and simultaneously, so amused. At our next table, Huiwen's gay-dar started flashing and beeping. Yep, one or two of the guys are gays. Even my faulty gay-dar was sounding a feeble alarm. Basically, when you are in a bar or club, the social rule is to drink, dance and hook up with somebody hookable. Clearly, hooking couldn't be performed at this table. So we promptly read the silent signals and left.
Huiwen later told me that one of the guys at the first table said that this activity of pimping girls is common in Korea. And yes, girls were being fished from the dance floor to be pimped to the guys on second floor, since these guys were willing to part with their cash for a bottle of whatever expensive alcohol. However, I wonder what these girls get in return for the sale of their 10 minutes of companionship. A place to rest their weary feet? A chance to meet up with a rich guy? Seriously, the social dynamics in a club has climbed up another notch in my 'This is interesting!' meter. Looks like an exciting site for an ethnography!
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