Learning sex in Hong Kong

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What would you say is good sex education to a child of eight who has yet to learn the basic knowledge of life:  that all girls have a vagina, babies do not come from a woman's anus, and penises are useful for more than peeing?  Just give the facts straight up would be my answer....the Hong Kong government thought differently.

For months there was talk about the need to teach safe sex to children, this was in the Eighties, when the whole world grappled with fear over the spread of AIDs seemingly overnight.  "The teachers ought to do something." was whispered among parents.  "Ain't our problem, these kids have parents." the teachers said.  In the meantime, we the children let our imagination play out with our Barbies and Kens, but really, nothing in our wildest dreams could come close to the actual genius of coupling.  Eventually, the government took matters into it's own hands.

It was deemed early on that teachers were unable to handle such a task, after all, their Gestapo like approach in keeping discipline would be seriously compromised by sex education.  Parents were also out of the question; the strict conservative Chinese parenting culture must not be meddled with either.  Time passes and frustration mounted as the city watched debates on the news discussing what to do, until one day, the government announced that it was producing a TV series to be aired on a prime time slot.  Immediately after that, a short ad was shown over and over, "The Nature of Sex", the show was to be called.

The parents were relieved.  At last, their children will learn the truth without any hassles to themselves.  They didn't mind loosing their favorite TV dramas to this upcoming new show either, in fact, they were looking forward to it because finally sex is on screen.  Before this, only soapy melodramas were available where the same pregnant wife character appeared again and again in different story lines, and she inevitably banged her bump like an African drum whenever her husband was unkind to her.

All this was followed by months of anticipation, until the day came when the first sex show was to air.  The city was electrified, we could not wait to get out of school; our teachers gave us less homework that day and sent us home with an unprecedented "Make sure you watch TV tonight.  Channel 2, seven o'clock."

Forgive me for remembering it so well, but really, it isn't something you'd forget given the circumstances.  This was the plot of the episode:

A boy of fifteen was living with his brother who was a cop after his parents had passed away.  The boy and his school friends were very curious about sex.  After playing sports in the evening, they took with them a ruler and stayed behind in the change room; they did something to themselves [not shown] which brought the boys a lot of pain.  

One day the boy was walking down the street when a young attractive girl ran quickly towards him, she was being chased by the cops.  She saw that she was cornered and she begged the boy for help.  The cops surrounded them, and the boy gallantly wrapped his arm around the girl and said to the police, "Why are you bothering my girlfriend?"  One of the cops ends up being the boy's brother, so the cops let them go.  The girl kissed him on the cheek, thanked him, gave him her pager number and said "Call me whenever, I'll give you a discount."

The boy couldn't stop thinking about the girl and her 'offer'.  He started saving money, and he purchased five condoms.  He reasoned he could wear three condoms for the first round and still have two backups for seconds.  During this time, he went through a moody period when he tried to decide if he should go through with paying for sex, his brother was worried about him.  

The boy decided to meet the girl, and they got a room somewhere.  She was in the bathroom when he tried nervously to put on a condom, he barely got one on him when the girl came out wearing nothing but a towel.  She smiled sweetly and unwraps the towel in front of him. [no sex or nudity shown]

The next scene both boy and girl were lying in bed.  He was calm now and was reflecting on what he just did when the cops burst into the room to arrest the prostitute.  One of the cop was the boy's brother.  

The final scene was the boy walking out of his school after he was suspended, and his friends rushed out to talk to him.  They asked him what sex was like, and they called him their hero.  He smiled proudly but told his friends not to have sex with prostitutes.  

- The end -

To this day I do not know what to make of it.  Two weeks after the show, my mom caught me and my sister playing a game of hookers and cops.  I'll leave it to you to conjecture the effects of this sex education to a generation of youngsters.

Jackie