FORTUNE COOKIE

by Bryce Courtenay

  ‘Jesus, most of the blokes in the bar probably come from lower middle-class families in Britain. In terms of class and sophistication you’re miles ahead. It doesn’t make sense.’

  Ronnie Wing emptied the contents of his wine glass before he responded, then signalled to Napoleon to refill it. Perhaps he needed time to compose an answer. ‘It’s the Chinese way, Simon. Sense, even commonsense, has nothing to do with it. For instance, five years ago this club was in the old GPO building when the Singapore Development Board summarily decided to kicked us out. “This is a government-owned building. All-white clubs don’t belong anymore,” was the unspoken message given to us.’

  ‘I can’t say I disagree with that,’ I said.

  ‘Ah, no, no, you don’t see it from the Chinese perspective. We moved here to Battery Road and the eviction made us even more exclusive. To Chinese, the way we are perceived by our peers – what we refer to as face – that is everything. Exclusivity is important, even if it means being a member of the Triads. Being one of a privileged few is seen as the gold standard. Now, Simon, your second question?’

  ‘Yes, you mentioned the Japanese and their economic miracle. The war memories are still pretty fresh in Australia – Changi Prison here in Singapore, the Burma Railway – we’re still coming to terms with doing business with the Japanese. But as long as there’s a quid or, now that we’ve changed to decimal currency, a buck in it, I guess we’ll find a way. But you blokes, the Chinese, in particular here on this island, doesn’t it … you know, isn’t it bloody hard to be civil to a Nip?’

  ‘Yeah, sometimes, when you hear the stories from your parents, read about the Sino–Japanese War. But in the end we’re Chinese; one way or another, shit has been happening to us for a long time.’

  I thought about Ah Koo who had lost his entire family to the warlord Hong Xiuquan, who had bizarrely assumed the name ‘Younger Brother of Christ’. It was the reason why I was an Australian, and had it not happened, I guess I’d be a Chinese peasant in a rice paddy guiding a wooden plough behind a buffalo.

  Ronnie shrugged. ‘The trick with the Japs is to turn the shit into pure gold.’ He laughed, adding, ‘Turds into eighteen-carat ingots.’

  ‘Yeah, my Chinese great-great-grandfather did precisely that,’ I acknowledged. ‘Only it was we Australians who gave him shit.’

  It was approaching three o’clock and we were the last in the dining room when Napoleon returned to say the bottle of gewürztraminer was empty. Lunch was, I presumed, close to over. I’d eaten, even had seconds – the curry was really something – but Ronnie hadn’t added to his initial mouthful of food and, despite the martinis and wine, didn’t seem any the worse for wear. Apart from the beer at the bar, I’d stuck to water. I reckoned that no matter how good he was at holding his grog, I now had a chance of staying with him if we kicked on.

  Ronnie leaned back in his chair. ‘Well, what’s it to be, Simon?’ He touched his face. ‘Home to nurse your wounds, or shall I show you the ropes? But first, one for the road at the bar, eh?’ He signed the chit Napoleon brought him and we left the club dining room and entered the bar, though a different one, this time a large, comfortable-looking lounge.

  Ronnie’s question in the dining room – ‘What’s it to be?’ – had been intentionally ambiguous. He was giving me a second chance. Was I going to be a piker and go back to the hotel, or would I play? Earlier on he’d been solicitous, now he was just a tad sarcastic. The drink was finally showing.

  He indicated a table for two placed beside a large picture window. ‘The view of the river is splendid from here,’ he announced as we sat in a couple of big, well-cushioned wicker chairs.

  ‘No, no, by all means, let’s kick on. I’m feeling fine. The sooner the better, I guess. Though I can’t promise to match you in the drinks department.’ I looked about the large room. A dozen or so patrons were lying on planter chairs with the backs down so they could stretch out full length, and appeared to be asleep, with their arms folded across their chests. One had his face and chest covered with a copy of the Straits Times. Another expat, who had only just adjusted his chair and stretched out, summoned a waiter, who promptly produced a piece of chalk and wrote on the sole of the man’s shoe.

  ‘Wait on, why are they numbering his shoe?’ I whispered to Ronnie.

  ‘Look around at the others,’ he suggested, indicating the sleeping men. And indeed they all carried a chalked number on the sole of one shoe. ‘It’s the time they wish to be awakened with a cup of tea.’

  Looking down at the river five storeys below, I saw that both the surrounding roads and waterway were teeming with traffic of every description. Small boats of every commercial configuration, floating rafts and punts with outboard motors crowded the river, and the roads were packed with trucks, rickshaws, bicycles loaded to the sky and men pulling handcarts. In the fly-buzzing afternoon calm of the Town Club lounge bar, I had to remind myself I was in the exotic East; that down there at street and river level it would be a bloody hard place to earn a living. I ordered another beer for Ronnie’s peace of mind, nominating a Carlsberg, and he ordered a Scotch over ice.

  ‘Well, where was I?’ Ronnie asked. ‘Oh yes, I’m afraid the downside is that if you don’t get pissed it could be a long evening. We rely on our clients getting a little drunk, but I’ll try to make it interesting for you anyhow. The upside is if you enjoy yourself with everything on offer, at least you’ll remember the experience in the morning.’

  I laughed nervously. ‘The “everything” – is that expected?’

  Ronnie Wing looked at me hard then smiled. ‘What, getting laid?’ He hesitated. ‘You’re not … ?’

  ‘A queen? No, of course not!’ I protested, feeling both indignant and foolish at the same time. I felt myself blushing.

  My host ignored my protest. ‘If you are, that isn’t a problem, Simon. In this ambisextrous candy shop of a town, the problem isn’t what your sexual proclivity may be,’ (big Ronnie Wing words) ‘it’s that you can’t possibly taste everything that’s available and openly on display.’

  ‘No, perhaps I didn’t make myself clear. I meant in a habitual sense. If, in the hopefully unlikely event you’re out with four different clients on four different nights, does that mean you’re in the saddle four times that week with four different bar girls or …’ I paused because I hated the word, ‘whores?’

  ‘No, of course not! Those terms, by the way, are interchangeable. It’s a matter of location. Bars have bar girls and brothels have whores. It’s a definition of place, not activity. The answer to your question is no, you only make it look that way. It’s essential to look like the stud you aren’t. If you don’t appear to be complicit, your client gets nervous, particularly the following morning.’

  ‘When, incidentally, he can’t remember a thing that happened?’ I added, aiming for a wry tone. ‘So, what’s the drill? What do you do, Ronnie?’

  ‘I select someone, a bar girl or pro I’ve previously taken a shine to, someone you have when you actually want to indulge yourself, someone you like, trust and enjoy as your permanent Suzie Wong. Then, whether you do or don’t use her, you pay her anyhow. It’s a great opportunity for a couple of hours of shut-eye. If you’re lucky and the client passes out or decides he wants to prolong the experience, you may even get a good night’s sleep. At any rate, your regular wakes you with a hot towel, a massage and a cup of chai, then tells you when the client has had enough and wants to go back to his hotel. By Asian standards, Singapore is a pretty safe city, even in the red-light district. If you choose the right Suzie Wong, you can often go home after the client has been dispatched with his choice, and she’ll see to it that he gets safely to his hotel. If it’s a brothel, the mama-san will do the same. You’ll soon get the hang of it.’

  ‘Mate, why don’t we just do shit-hot advertising so the Americans, Brits and Germans select us because we’re the obvious choice to make them lots of money?’

  Ronnie Wing looked at me. God knows
what he was thinking. But he kept his cool. ‘That’s a novel idea. I don’t think Sidney has ever thought of it quite like that. I guess it just isn’t the Chinese way.’ He thought for a moment. ‘Besides, it’s not the same thing.’

  ‘Oh, why’s that?’

  ‘Well, the money we’d be making for them doesn’t go to them as individuals, you see? They mostly work for international companies and the profit goes to London, Stuttgart, New York or Chicago. Money’s one thing, living the fantasy is quite another.’

  ‘At the risk of sounding like a prig, what if we forgot about squeeze and simply entertained clients in a good restaurant? Then, if they wanted to play afterwards, we could drop them off at their hotel, and they could get a callgirl the way it’s done everywhere else in the world – by asking the doorman.’

  Ronnie laughed. ‘God, we couldn’t do that! What, and miss the opportunity for squeeze? You don’t seem to understand, Simon, the Chinese don’t do business without squeeze.’ He laughed again. ‘I’m only kidding. But I still don’t think you understand the psychology involved. As I said before, it’s a way to bond with a client, the traditional extra dimension of doing business in Asia. Sex just isn’t a big deal here; it’s a way to be employed if you’re pretty and have no education, and it’s the way we’ve always done business – us, the Brits, everyone in South-East Asia.’

  ‘What? Prostitution is a tradition … er, I mean, an accepted way to be employed? Poor young Chinese women simply accept it as a job?’

  ‘Ah, now you’re beginning to understand, Simon. It’s a perfectly legitimate and generally accepted way of earning a living. As I said, it’s also a traditional way for us to do business. If we didn’t do it, and you may find this hard to believe, half the accounts in the agency would go to the opposition who do. It works for us, always has, and it works for the girls. In the end it harms no one!’

  ‘That’s hard to believe. You mean the girls choose to be prostitutes? Is that what you’re saying?’

  Ronnie sighed. ‘There you go again. Choice is the prerogative of very few; it comes with wealth. The Chinese peasant doesn’t think in terms of choice. Women in our society, the ones at the bottom of the heap, don’t choose, they survive, not only as prostitutes, but as charladies, servants, streetsweepers, labourers, peasants. But with a pretty young girl, the gods put a purse between her legs and she’s not ashamed to fill it with foreigners’ cash. Some few have risen to great wealth by getting their start in a whorehouse. When you’re unwanted in the first instance why would you be granted the luxury of choice? That’s both a ridiculous notion and not one that’s going to change in a hurry. Mind you, we have a relatively young prime minister in Lee Kuan Yew, who says his People’s Action Party is going to make it all happen. Abracadabra and we’ll all be equal, the maid and the millionaire. Now that we’re out of the Federation and back on our own, he has ambitions for Singapore.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘He’s already talking about hippies as long-haired drug peddlers and smugglers – “human detritus”, he called them at a private dinner I attended recently. In fact, there are rumours that he’s going to standardise haircuts – short back and sides for all.’

  I grinned and nodded towards the bar. ‘This mob will be happy. But how will that stop drug peddlers?’

  Ronnie shook his head. ‘Beats me. The Chinese have been smuggling and peddling drugs ever since the end of the Opium Wars. We all know who the real culprits are in Singapore and it’s not the hippies; rather, it’s one or two well-known Hong Kong Chinese millionaires. All this is prime-ministerial window dressing, meant to impress the American industrialists – the new Yank investors in South-East Asia he hopes to attract. With the Vietnam War still on, Lyndon B. Johnson has discovered the real potential of South-East Asia. Win or lose, the Yankees are coming into Asia to trade.’

  ‘And your PM wants Singapore’s share by cleaning up your act?’

  He nodded. ‘Yes, something like that. Which is the problem with an education at the London School of Economics and Cambridge – it doesn’t exactly keep one in touch with the man in the street. He recently described Bugis Street and its bars, brothels and transvestites as a place of institutionalised moral turpitude as well as an eyesore – everything that’s wrong with South-East Asia.’ Ronnie looked at me. ‘The man simply doesn’t comprehend. It’s what brings in the tourists and helps drive our economy. It is Singapore. He wants us industrially mean and squeaky clean. Next thing he’ll have us picking up cigarette butts from the pavements or he’ll ban smoking in public altogether!’

  I grinned. ‘You’d better have a haircut, mate, and so had I. What do you think? Will he succeed?’

  ‘What, clean up the sex industry? Not a snowball’s hope in hell. It’s not the Singaporean way or the Chinese way, hasn’t ever been, never will be.’

  ‘What about China, Mao’s communist revolution?’ I suggested. ‘They appear to have changed things.’

  Ronnie Wing looked at me and shook his head. ‘Yes, well … you will have noted how many Chinese from Hong Kong or here in Singapore are pushing down the fence on the Chinese border in a desperate scramble to get back into the motherland. Shit, Simon, communism is just another method devised to dominate and exploit the peasant. For all the rhetoric, Chairman Mao is no less an emperor than Puyi. The only equality between the communist elite and the Chinese proletariat is that they both wear denim. You can’t close down commercial pussy even if it is against the law. It’s Asia’s way of entertaining foreigners, has been since the Brits arrived here, in China and India. Girlie bars and brothels are an institution our PM meddles with at his peril.’

  ‘Oldest profession, eh? I guess it’s universal.’

  ‘Universal maybe, but not equally enjoyable. Have you ever been to a brothel on your own in a strange city?’

  ‘I confess not. Have you?’

  ‘Yes, on one occasion in Stuttgart. The Germans love Asia’s “tight” little almond-eyed girls. I was visiting an engineering company client and wanted to see if the Brunhilde archetype turned me on to the same degree. The brothel was full of blonde Polish whores with thighs like tree trunks and breasts the size of melons. I never got to find out because they were all frightened of fucking Genghis Khan, a six-foot two-inch Chinaman. I use the word Chinaman advisedly, because that’s what the German madam called me in English. “Nein, they don’t vont to fok a Chinaman, for zem it is very bod luck!” Ronnie mimicked. Believe me, there is nothing worse than solitary sex in a strange city.’

  ‘Yeah, okay, fine, I get it, but if it’s liberating and fun Boy’s-own stuff for visiting clients, what is it for us? Once in a while it might be fun, but not as a regular part of my job. No way! I came here to build a creative department, not to hold my client’s dick! Surely that’s not our responsibility? It isn’t built into the new business proposition or the agency agreement.’

  Ronnie Wing threw back his head and laughed. ‘Now he tells me!’ He paused. ‘Simon … I wish! Look carefully at the last line in the agreement, it’s written in invisible ink and plain for all to see if they want to keep the account safe. If it’s an agreement with an advertising agency here, Jakarta, Bangkok, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur or Manila, it’s there, all right, in three European languages, English, German and French, and soon, I dare say, in Japanese. “The visiting client shall get laid by a beautiful young Asian nymphette, facilitated by agency management who will be in attendance at all times to encourage, abet, excuse and forget.” ’

  ‘Wait on. This is supposed to keep the account safe? I don’t think so. Here’s a not-unlikely scenario. You set out to paint the town red, you both get pissed, the client says something you won’t cop from anybody, you abuse him and consequently lose the account.’ I raised my eyebrows. ‘It’s been known to happen in Australia.’

  Ronnie smiled broadly. ‘Got it in one, Brother Simon. Admittedly, it’s a thin line to tread and if you can’t hold your liquor, you’re right, it can be dangerous, even disa
strous. Nevertheless, the mandatory night on the town for foreign visitors is still required; it’s still part of the fucking job.’

  ‘Or vice versa,’ I added. ‘So who does the actual work in the agency?’

  ‘Ah, that’s just it, rain or shine, with or without a hangover that has you walking into the agency with your chin down near your kneecaps, you’re in the agency by 9 a.m. to organise your staff, go to a client meeting, answer the phone, see a supplier’s rep, write a piece of copy, whatever.’

  ‘And pretend you’re on top of things?’

  ‘Well, yes, with the help of your Suzie Wong, you’ll learn soon enough how to do that, Simon.’ He downed his Scotch. ‘Last Scotch, first brandy coming up.’

  ‘Oh, why the switch? First a martini, then wine, Scotch and now brandy?’

  ‘Only when the evening shift begins.’

  ‘How’s that? What’s so special about brandy?’

  ‘Take my advice, Simon, brandy is the only spirit that keeps the mood buoyant.’

  ‘You mean doesn’t depress?’

  ‘I didn’t say that. But if you mean below the belt, yes, no brewer’s droop.’

  ‘I’m not big on spirits, mate.’

  Ronnie Wing looked deliberately grim-faced. ‘You’re going to learn to stay out of Asian toilets as much as possible, and you know what beer does to the bladder. The only dependable “flush” in this part of the world is to be found in a game of poker. Plumbing isn’t our forté – especially in the girlie bars.’

  ‘Oh, nice,’ I laughed. ‘Perhaps Lee Kuan Yew will fix that as well.’

  Ronnie gave me a sardonic smile. ‘Well, he’s certainly good at stirring up shit. We’ll have to wait and see if he’s any good at cleaning it up.’

  As it transpired, Ronnie’s warning about toilets in South-East Asia, and not only in the girlie bars, possessed a great deal of truth.

  ‘Well, shall we be off? The first lesson from the Gospel of Asian Advertising is about to begin.’