Love at last for sex-starved singles
Print Edition
She lay quietly on a narrow bed, greeting potential customers with an impassive stare and a disproportionately buxom form: meet “156,” a stand-in companion for Chinese men with empty beds.
Named for her height, she is a high-quality sex doll made of thermoplastic elastomer, a rubbery material softer than silicone, with adjustable hands, a removable head and genitals, and available from specialist shops in Beijing for about US$2,500.
Liu — he didn’t want to give his full name — has one among the few possessions in his dimly lit studio apartment, in an industrial suburb of the capital.
Like millions in China who leave their homes to work in the cities, the 29-year-old car designer leads a bachelor’s life during the week, returning to his wife and toddler in Hebei Province every weekend.
Liu has been married for more than a decade and doesn’t want to be unfaithful, but still needs to satisfy his sexual appetites.
“Honestly, it is very easy to just pay a little money to find a woman in China, but I can’t bring myself to cheat on my wife,” he said.
But a blow-up alternative was not an option. “There’s no way I’d have sex with that kind of cheap inflatable,” he said.
Instead he forked out 15,800 yuan (US$2,543.77), almost a month’s pay, for his Chinese-made “156.”
Her removable parts make cleaning or replacement easier, but despite lengthy prior research, he was disappointed.
“As a designer I can’t neglect the details. So I just used it a few times,” he said.
Liu bought his doll from Micdolls in Beijing, where salesman Yi Jiange said: “Most people think the dolls are more attractive than real women.”
They come bald, with customers buying wigs for them according to their preferences.
Some models are also significantly shorter than “156,” for “convenience” he said.
His clients — whose preferences he discusses over a cup of tea — are usually professionals or business owners in their 30s and 40s, and he praises them as morally upright.
“If a married man uses a doll instead of a prostitute, isn’t it admirable?”
Buyers include user’s wives, Yi said, though he admitted that many clients’ partners “don’t quite accept” such dolls.
“My own girlfriend doesn’t agree with my work that much either,” he said.
China’s sex toy market is estimated at up to 100 billion yuan a year by sex toy platform ChinaSexQ.com.
Micdolls owner Zhang Han is expecting business to boom on the back of China’s severe gender imbalance.
“Many men have difficulty finding a girlfriend,” he said.
“That’s why they might use a doll as replacement.”
Also, for some buyers, dolls are not about sex, but love. Calling themselves “friends of dolls,” people gather online to share reviews and advice.
But for Liu, the “156” can do nothing to fill the emptiness of his bed.
“It doesn’t satisfy me at all,” he said.
“A doll’s perfection is derived from mathematical calculations, but it will never be more beautiful than a woman because she has a soul, expresses emotions and shows reaction.”
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