Last Christmas, I gave you my body: Hong Kong’s professional boyfriends and girlfriends

James, 20, swapped selling sex in Mong Kok massage parlours for a job with an ‘emotional connection’. Jason, 23, who has never had a girlfriend, buys dates on Instagram. Both live in the seedy world of compensated dating

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James Wong went from masseur to part-time boyfriend. Photo: Sylvia Yu

Published: 10:00am, 23 Dec 2018Updated: 10:44am, 23 Dec 2018

Dressed neatly in his preppy shorts and T-shirt and sporting a school-style backpack, it’s hard to believe James Wong started his career as a “massage boy” in some of Hong Kong’s sketchiest parlours.

Wong plied his trade in old hotels and residential buildings dotted around Causeway Bay, Mong Kok and Tsim Sha Tsui. But he didn’t get paid for the massages. Those he gave for free, instead making between HK$300 and HK$600 for having sex with (usually far older) men.

“Old guys and fat men tried to force sex while I massaged them,” recalls Wong, 20, now a university student majoring in engineering, who was just 18 when he started working in the parlours – though many of his coworkers were under 17.

It seemed like good money at the time, but the dangers it involved – most of the parlours were run by illegal gambling rings – and the inflexible working hours made him rethink his choice of employment. Instead, he decided to sell his services as a part-time boyfriend – in so doing becoming one of the growing number of young Hongkongers who have turned towards selling themselves on compensated dating websites – a trend that police criminologists say increases over the Christmas period.

Wong, who is gay, reasoned that the move would give him greater choice over his clients and enable him to make a more “emotional connection” with them.

This career is really special. I don’t have to pay for meals and entertainment