Liu Feifei takes off her sweaters, padded walking shoes and other winter clothes long before bedtime every night in northeastern China's Dalian, a city known for subzero temperatures.
She replaces them with open-toed shoes and a one-piece black dress with a wide semicircular cutout between her shoulder blades.
Her job is to sing with, talk with and snuggle up to Japanese businessmen until about 2 a.m. when Club Botan on Yan'an Road closes, as do four other Japanese-theme bars on the same block. Yet Club Botan's closing is not necessarily the end of the night.
If Liu or one of the 10 other twentysomething "companions" at the bar get along well with a client, the dalliances in Dalian can continue well toward dawn, but outside the bar.