Warning: This post contains adult content and may not be suitable for young children.
I will be attending the Australian Chamber of Commerce Ball this Saturday with Special Friend and about 1000 other Australians residing in Shanghai. These balls are thrown annually by every Country's chamber of commerce here as a charity event. Well leave it to the Aussies to throw a Rocky Horror Picture Show themed event to mark their 13th ball. I'm not sure if this is the case with other Chambers of commerce but the Australians give the option to their attendees to either dress in black tie or fancy dress (costumes) to match the theme. Guess which option is more popular...fancy dress of course...Yay. And we're talking all out costumes here. Last year was an 80's theme and legend has it a friend of ours went dressed as Cher from the "Turn Back Time" video (on the navy boat w/ very skimpy black one piece bathing suit)...this friend is a guy.
Since I've never seen the Rocky Horror Picture Show I was a bit "horrified" to find out it is basically on big drag show. Luckily the organizers of Austcham were a bit horrified of what would come as well so they changed the theme to include all types of horror costumes. So Special Friend and I settled on being vampires. Special Friend was deprived of Halloween dress ups while
growing up in Melbourne so watching his giddyness as he rifled through three huge rooms of Halloween costumes and accessories was like watching a 3 yr old girl get her first My Little Pony: Pure and unadulterated joy. The place we went to was an obscure storefront that I would have passed right by had I not been led there. When I walked in all I could muster beneath my surprise was, "Huh, so this is where it all comes from." Everything you could imagine for Halloween was in this shop. Banners, skeletons, candy buckets, lawn decorations, costumes, makeup, wigs, fake teeth. You name it it was there. The thing is,
China doesn't celebrate Halloween!!!!!! So what was all this for? Americans? Come October and you're putting up your fake cobwebs and witches, think of me as I paid homage where it originated :)We got most of the costume taken care of at the store but I needed something "signature" to make it stand out a bit. Since I won't really get a Halloween this year, which is now known as a free pass for usually conservative young women to dress a little more...um...un-conservative, I am using this event as my Halloween. My idea was to wear a boustier. I figured I'd be pretty covered by my cape and hell, if a guy can go as Cher in her miniscule bathing suit to this thing I can wear a boustier! Now where does one find a corset boustier in China?!?!? Let me remind you that this is the land of Hello Kitty and it was recently announced that a flagship Barbie megastore catering to twentysomethings with couture clothing and multiple cafes and restaurants will soon be opened right here in Shanghai (another story, another day). I scoured for specialty shops and found one that was by appointment only (translation- waaaayyy too expensive for what will probably end up soaked in wine and champagne by the end of the night). On a whim I wandered into a local mall which happened to have a lingerie section. And wouldn't you know it? Right there was exactly what I pictured in my head. The sales girl was more than happy to assist me leading me to believe she doesn't get many customers. What I didn't know is how eager she was to go that extra mile for the sale. Here's what transpired: First I asked for the biggest size (No. I haven't made a visit to the Chinese plastic surgeon for a bargain breast enhancement since I've been here. Chinese girls are small!). She handed me the boustier and showed me to the fitting room/cubby hole (read- very tiny). I turned to shut the door and discovered she had followed me in. O....K..... then ordered me to strip down and thrust the boustier on me. Just then it went from a slightly odd situation to downright ridiculous. Without warning she reaches into the boustier and grabs all that she can of both my babyfeeders and pushes them straight up into the boustier cups. It took about 5 seconds to get over the shock of what she had just done and look over to see her with the wide-tooth smile like that of a proud parent. In some countries that would have been grounds for a marriage. I have to say though, it was pretty magical, her work, but when I looked at the price tag my jubilation sank as I couldn't justify paying $150 when I've yet to secure employment. I had to break it to my sales girl easy that I wouldn't be buying her boustier. And so went my first breakup in China.
I wandered a bit more around the floor hoping for a miracle and to my amazement found, sitting on a sale table, the perfect boustier! I asked the sales lady (slightly older and a bit weathered hence sale table duty) for the biggest size again and was prepared this time for what was to come. When all of a sudden she turned me around right there and thrust the thing on over my clothes in front of everyone! There I was in the middle of this department store in jeans, a tanktop and black boustier! I ran around desperately looking for a mirror so I could ok it and take it off. It wasn't enough that I was getting stares as the white girl at the lingerie sale table but now I warranted them! The boustier was perfect though so I paid (a very reasonable $10) and ran. And so went my first undergarment buying experience in China. Austcham isn't going to know what hit 'em!
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