"Just tell them 'I'm sorry, this is a private club'."



That was the order from the boss of an exclusive establishment where I had only recently started working. It was so exclusive, it seems, that not even those attending a new fashion magazine launch party put on there were eligible to join. I would have to inform those interested that, in my boss' eyes, they weren't membership material.



The ad for this position didn't even ask for bartending experience; the club simply wanted a native English speaker. When I arrived for an interview, I had a hard time finding the place. Lion statues flanked the double-door entrance, yet no sign revealed the identity of this mysterious location.



A young Chinese woman with very good English met me at the door. Lacey was a ball of energy in a black suit from which a cream-colored ruffled collar peaked out. She brought me up the stairs to meet her boss, because, in her words: "This is a very special place. The boss must see if he likes you and if you will be a good match for the club."



I interviewed in English with the boss and his American wife in the elegantly decorated main room, which was meant to recall old China with a modern European minimalist style. The bar featured red and purple walls and big block of white candles stood on low-lying tables. The couple cautioned me, as Lacey did, that this was a "special place". The clients were older and looking to have some privacy, and I should be prepared for "unreasonable requests".



I nervously eyed the doors to other rooms, wondering what kind of brothel scenes lurked behind. In truth, these doors led to three separate private dining rooms, one larger banquet double-room, a cigar room and a kitchen.



I told them that my bartending experience was limited to a small restaurant in Southern Spain where the only cocktail ever ordered was a "tinto verano" (grape juice and club soda). Despite my lack of experience, I got the job.



I began working that night although many details about the club were left unexplained. I didn't even know what my salary would be.



Lacey filled in many of these gaps. During my first week of work, she showed me the membership fees. For the first 100 members to join, the annual membership fee was only 1,000 yuan ($130). The fee increased depending on whether a member joined among the first 500 members or the first 1,000. The highest membership fee topped off at 10,000 yuan - a price that many Chinese and foreigners could easily afford. But at this club, final approval of an application came from the boss.



Indeed, all of the roughly 150 or so members were the boss' friends. But it wasn't until the magazine party that I truly appreciated this selectivity.



At this event, I was also told to shame anyone who came dressed in jeans by pointing out their inappropriate attire. The guests were an array of English-language journalists, foreign advertising agencies, photographers and designers. The young Chinese and Japanese designers all wore jeans.



Several guests asked how they might join. We responded by telling them to call later for further information. But the boss pulled us aside halfway into the party. With a twinkle in his eye, he said that all of tonight's guests were not suitable for membership. And that was that.



Besides its exclusivity, the club had one other main attraction: wine. My first night I was let into the walk-in wine cellar. The boss told me his collection of almost entirely French Bordeaux wines was worth millions of dollars. We went into the cellar to fetch a $6,000 bottle for a member and his three guests who were sitting at the bar that evening. That was his third bottle of the night.



One night, a tall blonde Frenchman and his American friend, both in their 20s, sat at the bar with the boss for several hours. The two men were wine importers, and the blonde was there to showcase a new label he wanted to bring to China.



Throughout the night, the boss' friends would pop over to the bar and sample the red, white and ros varieties he brought. One woman who especially liked the ros needed to be educated about the different types of wine and in general bemoaned her lack of a discerning palette.



The boss, however, praised her for her courage to come out and learn. He even forgave her for wearing jeans that night.



My starting salary was 4,000 yuan ($519) per month for four days a week - low by expat standards, but high by Chinese standards.



I worked 10 or 12-hour shifts without overtime pay, which I thought was unreasonable, but for a Chinese worker, it just seemed fortunate that I only worked four days a week. Most of them worked six or seven.



My boss constantly stressed the possibility that other employees would regard me jealously. Consequently, I was an industrious worker.



Behind the bar I chatted with Chinese and foreign customers, I polished the crystal ashtrays fastidiously, and I made friends with my co-workers either through offering English lessons or through sheer persistence.



Unfortunately, Lacey's path to friendship with our co-workers seemed littered with more obstacles, because she was Chinese. She was not a novelty to them the way I was as an American.



Originally from Guangdong, Lacey never went to university but learned to speak English through working in a Beijing coffee shop. Her real passion was marketing, and she thought she would gain valuable experience by working at the club.



Her starting salary was 3,000 yuan ($390) a month. The typical starting salary at the club was 1,000 yuan. Her hours were supposed to be different, too, because she was supposed to work primarily on marketing and not serving customers from 10 am to 7 pm. Already less than a month into her time working there, she was forced to agree to extend her hours.



Also, her ideas for expanding club membership were constantly shot down by the boss. How was she supposed to market a club that was only open to her boss' acquaintances?



Eventually, I was hired for a daytime job, and I left the club after much consternation. I was going to miss my co-workers, and I learned that most of them had aspirations beyond their current careers. They said they had previous jobs with better hours and better pay, but wanted to work at the club to learn from the boss.



As the chef told me: "Many of us don't have the opportunity to study business in school, so learning about management at the club is the best way."



Just last week I got a call from Lacey. She told me she was fired from the club. One day she was talking to a member who worked at an IT firm.



Lacey mentioned that her boyfriend was an intern for a big computer company. The member asked for her boyfriend's information, and the boyfriend interviewed and got hired. The boss thought this was inappropriate and constituted grounds for letting her go. "I don't understand," she told me. "My foreigner friends say they don't think that I did anything wrong."





(China Daily 05/30/2007 page18)
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