Pizzas and prostitutes

I was out until 2AM on Friday night a’drinking beer and a’laughing and a’messing about. Anyway that resulted, as it so often does, in a big old hangover. Spent most of Saturday either in Wagas (my favourite café in Shanghai) drinking coffee and stuffing egg and bacon sandwiches in my big fat face or on the sofa watching the World Cup cricket final.

Any old hoo, there was the offer of a drink on Saturday night but I was too knackered so I resolved to stay in and watch a film and eat a pizza. Soabout 8:15, I left the building and walked over the road to that famous Shanghaiese restaurant “Pizza Hut” to get a takeaway pizza. The service, as ever, was swift, polite and efficient and before long I was ushered  out the door with a 12 inch Hawaiin (a pizza, not a euphemism). On my return to the apartment complex I was accosted by a polite young Chinese bloke who asked me if I wanted a massage in my room and showed me a picture of some naked women. He was quite insistent that I would enjoy the massage and promised a “happy ending.” As he followed me along brandishing this picture of, admittedly quite saucy looking birds, it dawned on me that he was a pimp offering me the services of what amounted to nothing more health giving than a shag with a Shanghai hooker! Fuck me! Or in this case don’t fuck me. Anyway I turned him down with a polite,

“No thanks, mate.”

But he was insistent and kept following and kept brandishing, so I waved my pizza at him and said

“Pizza.”

And that was that. He gave up and buggered off.

What I like about this lengthy story is that, despite the massive difference in culture and understanding, he instantly appreciated that the prospect of eating a pizza was a perfectly reasonable excuse for not wanting a shag.

And it warmed my heart. Truly the yawning chasm in Anglo-Sino cultures is gradually disappearing. A welcome rapproachment with pizzas and prostitutes in the vanguard.

PS. This post doesn’t count in the poll. The next one does. Oooh what’s it going to be about? Exciting isn’t it.