The 2.5 million soldiers of the People's Liberation Army, the world's biggest military force, is matched by an almost equal number of prostitutes. In 1997, police arrested 250,000 prostitutes, only a small part of the industry that was originally banned by the Communists when they came to power in 1949. Nowhere is the decline of public morality more obvious than in Tianjin, China's prostitution capital. The whole gamut of arrangements between men desperate for sex and women desperate for money is on display.
Limousines ferry live-in mistresses to expensive restaurants past street prostitutes.
At luxury high-rises, where the mistresses live, rivals go from door to door soliciting their services while their sugar daddies are entertained in private rooms at karaoke bars. When business is good, street prostitutes work in massage parlours. At the Nice Face hair dressing salon, Linda was waiting for customers in her short skirt and stockings. She took an English name when she came to Tianjin from her home province of Sichuan,where she had never seen a foreigner. She hopes to return home soon and to take several thousand dollars with her.