In a bizarre incident, a racy restaurant in China where provocatively dressed male waiters served food in raunchy ways, has been shut by the authorities after inviting social media attention.
The eatery, known as the ‘Macho Restaurant’ started operating this April in the popular Xishuangbanna Dai autonomous prefecture of southwest Yunnan province. However, the self-styled restaurant suffered a premature end when officials closed it down last month after videos of rather immodest scenes on the premises began circulating online.
In some of the videos, the scantily dressed male waiters, often muscular and tall, went around the tables and engaged in seductive dancing, including police dancing among other routines to serve the meal.
The restaurant attempted to be a mishmash of an adult entertainment destination, coupled with food where customers received suggestive dancing, and in some cases food, albeit, mouth-to-mouth.
“No need to go to Thailand, you can experience a male model restaurant right here in Xishuangbanna!” a Chinese netizen was quoted as saying by Beijing Youth Daily.
Pivoting on initial strategy
A member of the staff told the Daily that the restaurant pivoted to the ‘racy pole dancing’ strategy since the business remained mild after opening. To bring in more money, the restaurant hired well-built performers and soon enough, the customers started coming in.
“Initially, there were just six actors offering relatively normal dance performances. When customers filmed at the restaurant and shared the videos online, the restaurant owner saw it as a promotional opportunity,” said one of the workers.
Despite the restaurant’s popularity, the authorities took action, considering the risque performances as a breach of social ethics, and detriment to the area’s cultural traditions.
“As a frontier province, Yunnan has seen some commercial performances that have been borrowed from foreign countries, which may infiltrate the cultural market in the border area and undermine the inheritance of our national outstanding traditional culture,” an officer of the Enforcement Bureau of Yunnan Provincial Department of Culture and Tourism said.
On July 26, the authorities served the cease operations notice, confiscated the illegal income (approximately $1,600) and imposed a fine, 10 times that of the illegal earnings recovered.
(With inputs from agencies)
