Wang Chunlei knows she's beautiful. On stage in a Shenzhen karaoke bar called Lucky, she is putting everything into her singing, one jewelled hand holding the microphone, the other waving goodbye to an imaginary lover. Her tight black top sparkles with sequins, her face glows and the audience showers her with applause.
Wang usually visits two or three bars a night, driving between each in her Audi. She is paid 100 yuan (HK$113) for a 30-minute performance and 20 per cent of that ends up in her DJ/agent's pocket; leaving little to pay for the car and her diamond rings. But like many singers in Shenzhen's karaoke bars, Wang harbours a thinly veiled secret: she has a wealthy patron. She is an ernai, one of millions in the mainland.
Ernai means 'second wife' and is the term used to describe a mistress of a married man. Those who have managed to snag a particularly wealthy businessman or official, as Wang has, enjoy their own apartment, a designer wardrobe and the luxury of leisure.
Before the Communists outlawed the practice when they came to power in 1949, rich and powerful men kept concubines to enhance their prestige. In recent decades, a relaxation of the party's control over society and growing wealth have sparked a spectacular resurgence of concubine culture; manufacturers and retailers of luxury goods joke that the market for designer handbags and expensive watches would collapse if the army of ernai started to shrink in numbers, which may already be happening as the global financial crisis bites.
Shenzhen is well populated with ernai. Places such as Huanggang, just across the border from Lok Ma Chau, have been nicknamed 'ernai villages'. Before Deng Xiaoping turned the surrounding pocket of land into a special economic zone, Huanggang was a small village; now it is packed with nondescript residential blocks. Lucky is on a street dominated by restaurants, mahjong parlours, beauty salons and bars.
Inside one of Lucky's private rooms, 28-year-old Wang reflects on her life. Born in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province, she ventured south 10 years ago, hoping to become a star. With no formal training, she struggled to land a job as a singer and instead found work as a waitress in a karaoke bar.
'That was the hardest time in my life,' she says. 'I was jade in the palms of my parents but suddenly I had to fend for myself and I was treated like a cheap piece of straw.'