Beijing's 'Lala' Scene -- A Chinese Lesbian Speaks Out
From a very young age I knew I liked women. I always hung out with boys, but I had no feelings for them. They could sense it. At school, boys would say to me, "There's a really pretty girl over there, go check her out!" Then I'd go over and come back to my friends to confirm whether she was pretty. So they knew I liked women, although we never spoke about it directly.
I didn't know there was such thing as a lesbian until I got older. I first heard about them by watching television and reading. Then when I was 18, I started using the Internet. I suddenly found out, damn, there are chat rooms full of people like me!
It's very comfortable to chat with people online, but when you meet them in person a lot of times you just want to leave and go home. The things they say to me are different from the things they'd say over the Net. Maybe it's because they're nervous or something. But I have met two girlfriends though the Internet.
I have not come out to my parents, but my mother knows about me. But not at first. When my ex-girlfriend Xiniu and I started living together, I told my mother that we were friends. Because we were so much alike, my mother assumed that nothing was happening between us. From that point on, she stopped worrying about me. In the winter she would say, "It's so cold, it's better if you two sleep together in the same bed." And then I'd smile and say, "Yeah ma, I know." [laughing]
Later, when I broke up with Xiniu, I went a little crazy. For a period of time I didn't speak. I would just stare into space. My mother suggested to me that I should be more careful about the friends I make. But then later I met this girl in the picture [points to the photo of a long-haired girl next to her bed]. This time, my mother knew about our relationship, because this girl was clearly a P (femme). We met during summer vacation and got along really well. When I went back to Qingdao with my mother, after a while this girl quit her job and followed me there. My mother didn't like this at all. She said, "How could she just follow you here? You two have problems!" I told her that there was nothing between us. "Nothing? I see the way you look into each others' eyes! It's not right."
But there was nothing my mother could do. So she told me not to ignore my studies and left me alone about all other things.
My girlfriend's family knew everything. They didn't care. Her mother and father were very kind to me. I'd go stay over at their home, and her mother would bring me an extra blanket to sleep with.
I used to get really depressed when I'd think about my family and my future. But since I've entered the lala (lesbian) community in Beijing, I've gotten to know a lot of people, both online and in the bars.
The first lesbian bar in Beijing was "Diqiu" (earth bar). I used to go there all the time. There was also a lala bar in Xidan -- even the owner was a lala. That place wasn't open for long, only six months, before it was closed down by the police. I still remember that night. We were dancing at the time, and when the police came, the lights and the music were turned off. We felt like criminals. The police looked around for a while, took down some names and left.
Later, there was a bar in the Sanlitun area called "Lanyueliang" (Blue Moon), and another called "Hudie" (Butterfly), where we would hang out. But afterwards, the meeting place was the On-Off bar.
On-Off was opened by a gay man, but back in the day, Thursdays and Saturdays were open to lesbians. We all went there. Actually, one straight friend used to come with me to the On-Off bar. Well, she used to be straight. She had always said to me, "Bring me to one of those lala parties! I want to see what it's like. Wouldn't I be a gorgeous P if I made myself up?" She was very curious about it. I think that this thing called lala is very contagious. If you are a lala and you bring a non-lala friend to a party, it's likely that she'll be assimilated. She doesn't have to think about all the things she has to think about when she is with a guy. She can say anything to girls. Her dormant desire to love women is in this way brought out.
Feng bar was the major hot spot for lalas until a few months ago, when it was closed by the police. I don't know why. The bars here are closely connected to the police. The owner has to know how to handle them. Maybe the shows were the problem, because there were often transsexuals performing there, as well as gays.
Now Yesu is the only lala bar in Beijing. How sad! It's a lonely little place, but there's nowhere else to go anymore. I think this generation is already lost. It's up to the next generation of lalas. There have been lots of great ideas, but none of them have worked out.
One example, there was a lala conference that was organized two years ago in Beijing, open to the public. It was amazing! A lot of lalas from Hong Kong and Taiwan were there. They held classes inside a school and had a big party. There was a kind of lala film festival, but the police came and closed it down. They arrested all those who attended, and from that time onwards, many of them were closely watched and monitored by the police. Their phones were tapped, too. So it was really hard for them and they all left the city. Some went to Shanghai and some went to Guangzhou.
So now, I'm trying to focus on my studies. I want my final design project for school to be about lalas. But I'm scared that if I put in lesbian content, it might screw up my chances of getting into a masters program at the university. I want to write something about lalas, or if I can't talk about this directly, at least I can express it through images. I just have to muster up my courage, and take a chance.
* * *
Having made the preceding entry I took a little time flitting around the Web and found gay Chinese-Canadian journalist Jo Wong's account of a visit to the Feng bar.
Lala girls don't wait in line
It starts when she pushes me off my stool at the bar. "I'd like to sit here," she says. Her soft, Beijing-accented Chinese is lovely. The "r" sounds rolling, with no harsh edges.
She's got permed, pop-star hair, size large. Spaghetti strap black tank top, slightly baggy jeans held up by a white, fake diamond studded belt. A Chinese femme hipster.
In Canada, I'd be a little surprised if a stranger pushed me off my barstool. But in China pushing's a way of life. In a country of 1.3 billion, only suckers line up. In the train station, at the grocery store, on the subway, and yes, at the local lesbian bar, you push, or get pushed over.
She's cute. I tell myself I'm just letting her win. She hands me a lukewarm glass of China's unofficial national drink-green tea and chivas regal-as a consolation prize.
Around us, groups of girls are flirting over pitchers of it. Pretty-boi stud types lean against babes in leather jackets, sporty dykes dance with wispy-haired funksters. Not a woman over 30 in sight.
She holds my gaze. And then: "So, handsome. Want to be my girlfriend?"This girl moves fast. I quickly glance outside the bar window. Is that a Chinese U-Haul truck I see in the parking lot?
"Errr," I stammer, desperately searching for the suavest way to say no. "I think we should get to know each other first. Where I come from, that's usually how we do things."
She frowns a little, fiddles with her glittery necklace. Shania Twain's nasal crooning comes on over the sound system-"I'm gonna getcha baaaybe!" I quickly change the topic and ask my would-be suitor: "So, um, what's your name?"
I've been in China almost a year, and this is the first time I've caught a Chinese lesbian's eye. Friends blame it on my short hair and skater-boy clothes. In China's lesbian economy of desire, I'm in low demand.
It is the femmes known as "P"-short for po, the Chinese word for "wife"-that quickly fly off the shelves into coupledom.
As a 25-year-old, slightly boyish Chinese-Canadian dyke, here I'm pegged as a "T" for tomboy. It's a sometimes rigid, sometimes flexible label that shapes everything from who I'm supposed to date to what I should do in bed.
China's indigenous lesbian culture has mysterious origins. Local girls tell me they think the terms P and T were imported from Taiwan and Hong Kong, where vibrant public gay movements have been active since the 1990s; others cite influences from the internet and global gay culture.
Some queer activists and scholars blame the idea of T and P on China's Confucian-influenced history of strict gender roles, and the social discrimination facing lesbians today.
Same-sex relationships and acts aren't illegal in China, but it was only in 2001 that homosexuality was removed from the official state list of mental disorders. In the countryside, some people still believe homosexuality is a disease that can be cured.
Pressure on young gays and lesbians to marry can be so overwhelming that some choose to wed each other to stave off family criticism. Chinese queers shopping for platonic opposite-sex partners "arrange" marriages through ads on gay and lesbian websites; some attend special parties for introductions.
However it happened, the T and P divide now dominates China's gay scene-although there is a growing number of younger women who call themselves bufen, a word that literally means "no divide" and can be loosely translated as "flexible."
Back at the Beijing lesbian bar, I find out my suitor's name is Suki. She's 23 and works at a record label, managing pop-star hopefuls. "My last boyfriend was Canadian, like you," she tells me. "But I couldn't stop having these feelings of passion for women."
Unlike many younger women, Suki lives away from her parents with a roommate, giving her the freedom to pursue handsome Beijing Ts. She's called herself a lala-China's term for lesbian-for three years, and has already had six girlfriends.
"I'm not wearing a bra," she says, suddenly pulling my hand up into softness beneath her shirt and pressing her lips tight against mine.
What is a Canadian T to do? I kiss her back, closing my eyes to block out the frenetic strobe lights of the bar.
"So," Suki breathes into my ear. "When you have sex, do you take your clothes off?"
"Er, yes," I reply. "That is generally the way we do it in Canada."
"And when you have sex, do you let girls touch you?" she says, running her fingers lightly under the waistband of my jeans.
"Er, yes," I reply. "That is also generally the way we do it in Canada."
"My T girlfriends never let me touch them," she says. "I want to touch you. Come home and make love to me."
I believe it's at this point I was meant to say the Chinese equivalent of "I'm all yours, gorgeous."
Instead, I hear myself say: "I'm sorry, I can't. It's not my culture. We need to date first... I'm Canadian."
Did I actually say that?
I could blame the utter lameness of my answer on the green tea and chivas, or on the fact that Chinese is my third language. But in truth, I'm still a little lost in the complexities of lesbian international relations. Who would have imagined an urban Vancouverite dyke, outplayed by a woman born into what's allegedly the Communist capital of the world?
Suki takes it all in stride. She turns her back to me, grabs a nearby spiky-haired girl and starts grinding. No more browsing the foreign goods this evening.
When I tell a Beijing-born friend about Suki the next day, she laughs and says: "Everything in China is changing-the economy, the culture, the lesbians. Some of the younger lala girls, they are very aggressive about getting what they want."
Like I said. In a country of 1.3 billion, only suckers line up.
Oh, ambitious China, homeland of my grandparents, I've learned my lesson. Next time I go to Beijing's dyke bar - or the grocery store for that matter - I'm heading straight for the front of the line.
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