SEX WORKER Ruo Xiaoan has been hailed as a modern-day Suzie Wong after her highly evocative postings on the Twitter-style Weibo social network won her hundreds of thousands of followers, and which some commentators believe is of high literary quality.
Some of Ms Ruo’s posts are titillating, but many are poignant and have struck a chord with readers on Weibo, the microblog of choice for 200 million Chinese, and she now has 231,000 followers.
“Night is deepening, the client has gone, a single man . . . It’s a pity that it was only for a short time, not even a full night, he belonged to me. His cigarettes tasted sweet. The rain is heavy outside. I wonder if he will remember me when he gets home?”
Ms Ruo reportedly has had 3,000 clients in seven years and lists policemen, university professors and local celebrities among her clientele.
So popular has the woman dubbed “China’s best educated prostitute” become, that there are reports she has been arrested. Prostitution is illegal in China, but remains widespread through karaoke bars and massage parlours around the country.
There have been no postings on Ms Ruo’s microblog site since September 16th, but the 22-year-old woman’s writings often read like a contemporary Chinese version of John Cleland’s Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure, a first person narrative about the exploits of the legendary 18th century courtesan, Fanny Hill.
“I know am a prostitute, but I am always eager to meet someone to love. Some clients joke about marrying me, but I know that my image can never change. Autumn is harvest season, let me fall into the earth like a leaf,” she wrote.
The poetic tone is often underscored with social critique. “This society raises wolves, I learned this many years ago, but it’s your own choice whether you are a sheep or a wolf . . . I don’t want the face and teeth of a wolf,” she wrote.
She also has much support among online followers who compare the oldest profession with the country’s nouveau riche.
“She sells her body to get money, but compared with the “rich second generation” who show off their luxurious lives and Louis Vuitton bags, who should be ashamed?” wrote one.
However, it may all have an unhappy ending for Ms Ruo. She has apparently been detained by the Hangzhou police. But others say she has been forced to leave for her home town.