China World, Chapter 5

"Do this so you can get to Di Columbus."
	Penelope told this to herself as she was on her hands and knees facing the dinner table  lengthwise. Lai Fu had decided to share some food because she and her guests were feeling 'charitable.' The tile floor hurt her knees, but she had to smile because the way all of their eyes were trained on her it was clear they expected it. Penelope's comportment was always under scrutiny – now these women wanted her to smile as she licked rice noodles from the ground next to their bare feet.
	How could a ritual like this catch on with people? Penelope couldn't fathom it. But each of the dinner guests had picked out a small portion of her meal and dropped it to the floor as a gift to the white servants. As Penelope crawled forward, her view was partially blocked by the table so all she could see was six pairs of legs and twelve feet resting on the floor in front of her. There were leftovers sitting on the ground, and it would be very rude for Penelope to refuse such a generous gift! She involuntarily glanced up at the two women nearest to her – a small Vietnamese girl and an inebriated Korean woman who gave her an imperial look and pointed around her bare feet using her chopsticks. She made a quick remark that Penelope couldn't understand.
	"Go ahead," Lai Fu said.
	Penelope swallowed hard and began to crawl forward, awkwardly squeezing beneath the crowded table. Her face flashed crimson red but she tried to console herself with the fact that the women couldn't see her look of rage as she crawled to each of their feet and lapped up whatever food they had dropped. She had to keep her balance and find every bit of food, so it was a challenge.
	She started with the Vietnamese girl on the left who had very small feet and muscular calves. A small piece of broccoli, smaller than a robin's egg, was resting neatly between both of her bare feet. As Penelope reached to pick it up, the Vietnamese girl didn't even bother to move her feet, so that Penelope brushed them slightly with her hands. The broccoli tasted fantastic but was so small that it was more of a tease than anything.
	Turning to her right, Penelope wanted to scream. The Korean bitch had dropped a rice noodle in such a way that it was resting atop her foot! With complete revulsion she picked it up and at it, wiping the residue from the Korean woman's foot afterwards. Her toes were painted black, and her feet were quite a bit larger than the Vietnamese girl's. Penelope had to slurp the noodle into her mouth, shuddering as she could only stare at the the Asian woman's feet while she was eating. Like they wanted a link, in her mind, between her subsistence and her degradation. It wasn't even a full-sized noodle, either, the lady had taken a bite out of it already.
	As Penelope ate the horrid thing, the Korean woman said something above her and the entire table broke out into laughter.
	Penelope went on like this, taking each woman's offering into her mouth, beside herself with anger and humiliation at her circumstances. A couple of the women had just carelessly dropped their food to the side of their chairs, perhaps not wanting to fully participate in this scene. But even then, Penelope could feel their eyes on the back of her head making sure that she ate the food, showed enthusiasm, and left nothing behind. She was also expected to look up and each woman profusely for sharing and some didn't even give her eye contact in return.
	Lai Fu was last, seated at the head of the table. Lying beside her long toes was a piece of chicken – a rare treat for a white girl in the New Kingdom. Penelope was happy for this little perk until she first bit into it. Rubbery and rigid, she realized it was just a bad piece, mostly cartilage with barely any meat. Then the ordeal was over, and she returned to the wall so that Sarah could take her turn eating food beneath the table.
	The women finished their dinner shortly after, Lai Fu observing her duty as hostess to make Sarah and Penelope throw the leftovers away in the trash. It was unthinkable for the servants to bring food home with them – rude even to ask. Such handouts made white women lazy; instead they were permitted to lick the Asian women's chopsticks clean after each meal which kept them perfectly hungry and willing to negotiate. A great shame crept over her, that she had just eaten scraps of food from the floor but no one made a big fuss about it. With absolutely no food remaining on the dishes, they brought them back to their apartment to wash and return later.
	Sarah didn't seem very pleased about the dinner.
	Penelope thought that it must have been even worse for her, having to cook all the food and then only being permitted to eat a tiny portion of it. Nobody even thanked her for the meal – all praise went to Lai Fu for her skills in managing her domestic help. At least, that was Penelope's suspicion. She couldn't understand their Mandarin, but women seemed to make flattering comments when Lai commanded her servants to do something as though they admired her stewardship.
	They were quiet on the way back to their apartment, Penelope feeling bone-tired after the kowkan was completely out of her system. The desire for more white powder remained.
	"Have you scheduled a reiki session? You did kowkan today, right?" Sarah asked Penelope as they stacked the dirty dishes into the sink.
	"No, I don't know where to go for that."
	Sarah paused.
	"I can do it for you tomorrow," she said, "I am allowed to use a studio up the street, from Miss Nguyen. Do you want to do it after work?"
	"Sure," Penelope replied.
	She used to enjoy reiki. The idea of lying down for an entire hour, doing nothing, while someone focused on her wellness was even more appealing now.
	At the end of a long day, Penelope slept as best she could considering one of her roommates was watching a celebrity gossip show at an annoying volume. The television program was in Mandarin language, but tailored to a white audience. Chinese women would emerge from limousines, smiling as the paparazzi took photos and asked them softball questions. Then commentators would discuss the shoes the women wore, the vacations they had gone on, and their latest projects in film and music.
	The commentators were Asian, the stars were Asian, and the producers were mostly Asian women. They made big decisions and set world philosophies while the dishes were still piled up in Penelope's sink but she was too exhausted to do anything about that right now...
	**
	Penelope's smartwatch sent her somewhere else this morning, to the foot massage parlor she had been assigned to as punishment for damaging Council property. Outside her apartment, she waited for the bus, jealous of all the women who could afford cars and taxis which went a lot faster.
	She sniffed. Ugh, the day after a cocaine binge.
	Penelope passed many other foot massage parlors on the way to hers. She would look inside each one to get a sense of what the job entailed. Some were combined with coffee shops or book stores, some were like nail salons, some like private health centers. A few seemed to function like semi-public lounges for women to spend time while getting massages. The uniforms and styles of each parlor were different but one thing they all had in common: every time a Chinese woman walked in, she was treated with reverence and catered to perfectly by the smiling staff of white women.
	Her new parlor was near New Beijing University, and Penelope saw that it was lavish. They had decorated it in a stylized version of ancient Greece – the employees dressed in short dresses that looked like ivory white togas. Some had golden belts cinching their waists in, others were made of just leather. Shiny metal bracelets featured heavily in each woman's costume, slave bangles.
	"You're the new one?" said the receptionist asked, a bored Chinese woman in her mid 20s.
	"Yes, Miss."
	"Okay," the woman replied, barely looking at Penelope's ratings that had come up on her phone to review.
	"Change into the outfit. You have your first appointment in 10 minutes."
	Penelope walked through the parlor on her way to change.
	In front, there was a large public area filled with sofas and tables and divans where women could settle in, doing work or just relaxing with friends. Towards the back, there were several private treatment rooms behind a white curtain walls. Walking past them, Penelope saw that each one contained a massage table, or waxing equipment, or a device to give facials. She changed into the costume they provided, which was surprisingly high-quality fabric. Penelope couldn't be sure, but she strongly believed that her costume's slave bangles and bracelets were made of real gold.
	It looked good on her in the mirror, but when she went to join all her co-workers out on the floor, it just felt like a uniform. A uniform that showed a lot of her youthful figure, celebrating her toned legs and narrow waist. Her shoes were some preposterous open-toed Roman marching boots made with a very small amount of leather.
	'At least we have air conditioning working here," Penelope thought later as some of the last employees filtered in.
	Penelope's first appointment was some college girl, who just stared nervously at her laptop screen the entire time. She barely commented on the quality of the massage, and only paid for half an hour of time. She probably just wanted to use this as a quiet place to study. Soon the parlor had half a dozen customers, each one being glad-handed by an employee.
	"Can I have someone do my shoulders, too?" the college girl asked Penelope.
	"Uh, yes, Miss. Let me just ask the owner," Penelope replied even though this was her first day and she had been given no training on how to make that happen.
	One of the other girls was nearby at the ready.
	"Hi! You want a shoulder massage? I can totally do that for you!"
	No more words than that were exchanged. Penelope just stared at the Asian student's feet trying her best to stroke and caress them as best she could. The gold bracelets weren't practical for this work – they jingled and got in the way of things until Penelope learned to be more mindful of the way she moved her wrists and their angle relative to her body.
	Penelope looked down to the white flats that the girl had worn into the parlor. There was no dirt, dust, or noticeable signs of wear except for the slight imprint of her soles. New Beijing was one of the cleanest cities in the world, owing to the fact that it could have women detailing the sidewalks every day, with toothbrushes when necessary. One societal bonus of this arrangement was that these Chinese women could wear nice shoes always without getting them dirty too quickly. But it certainly helped that the white girl was on hand to clean such shoes as often as possible, of course.
	The college girl seemed to be maybe Thai and Japanese both, with a small frame and delicate looking except for her self-assured demeanor. Penelope never got to see what was on the laptop screen, although her co-worker doing the shoulder massage might have.Eventually there were more customers in the salon than there were massage girls. When Penelope finished with one, she had to quickly move to another client.
	The costumes helped the client to depersonalize the experience, if they wished. She could pretend that the workers were all interchangeable, because any white girl in a toga would do her bidding. Or the client could play along with the uniform, acting like that her attendant really WAS an ancient servant or peasant girl – times hadn't changed that much, and a white girl always needed to be told what to do and given swift corrections when she misbehaved.
	Her third client was a young Persian woman who drank an expensive juice that was hand-delivered to her while Penelope was massaging her feet. She had very thick black hair and large brooding eyes, and almost certainly had gotten a nose job. There was just something too perfect about it, and cosmetic surgery was very affordable and common, even encouraged.
	"Duste daram!" the Persian girl called out when two of her friends walked in.
	She waved them over to the sofa, which was large enough for the three of them to sit together even though one of them was very large.
	"Duste daram," they replied.
	One had long curly hair and big eyes, and the other was shorter with a very full face and curvaceous body. Penelope's client looked down at her as she continued her foot massage and spoke:
	"It is so busy here, girl, can you give Esther and Azar foot massage too, after you finish mine? Twenty minutes."
	Penelope saw that the women were already removing their footwear and making themselves comfortable on the tufted sofa. It took a lot of dedication to ignore the fact that the plus-sized woman hadn't washed her feet and was now exposing Penelope to their foul fragrance – she could smell it as soon as Azar took them off. It wasn't THAT hot out!
	"Yes, miss," Penelope replied, looking down at her work, stuck here for the next hour.
	If Penelope got too distracted by looking around, she would receive a rebuke for it. So all she had to focus on was her client's feet, and the different ways of massaging them. After twenty minutes working on her client's tanned feet, Penelope moved over to Azar who was the heavy-set friend with a moon-shaped face.
	Azar's feet were very soft, and the weight of them was heavier than Penelope had experienced so far. She clearly had no issue with putting her unwashed feet in Penelope's lap, which made the girl cringe and was certainly unsanitary for the rest of the establishment.
	"Sorry, I did not wash my feet this morning, because I know I am coming here," Azar said as though that excused the indignity of what she was doing.
	"No problem, Miss!" Penelope chirped, reaching for the massage butter.
	The Arabic women all laughed, and Penelope got the sense that they were making racist remarks about her – maybe saying that white women enjoyed doing this sort of work.
	Or that they were meant to do it.
	Occasionally Penelope would chance a look up from Azar's sweaty feet to see what was happening in the rest of the parlor but it was always about the same picture. There were Asian and Middle Eastern women lounging about while servile white women massaged their feet and their shoulders and fetched them food and drinks. A few of the women even were even getting their make up done in the salon, which apparently was one of the more high-status job a white girl could aspire to.
	There were so many customers that Penelope and her co-workers would certainly not get a break. Whenever they tried, there was always a demanding woman nearby to ask for refills, or request table service, or maybe she wanted her shoes hand-detailed while she received her daily foot massage. The price for these services, like all services done by white women, was kept low so that any Chinese woman could reasonably afford it. Although some foot massage parlors were certainly more 'upscale' than others, which lead Penelope to believe that perhaps women were socially conscious of which ones they patronized.
	Interestingly, Penelope did notice that certain salons utilized nonwhite employees. But such salons were seen as more prestigious, and warranted much higher prices from her understanding. She suspected that even if the service was exactly the same (or worse), it would be valued much more highly.
	"They always see us in a servant's position," Penelope realized as she did continuous wringing massage strokes on Azar's meaty calves.
	"It must be part of the reason they believe that white women are inferior. And we can't argue against it because then we would be given one star, or fired, or sent to jail!"
	 A wave of anxiety passed over Penelope as she realized that she was trapped here, beneath this lady's feet. She didn't have the freedom to quit and go look for another job – any job available to a white girl would be about as servile and demeaning as this one. And quitting would be an insult to the lady who was so nice as to offer Penelope a job! Every misstep was met with serious retaliation and further perpetuated the social stigma of "being lazy" that a white girl could never truly overcome. Forget quitting -- she could barely even use the bathroom on her own terms! If a Chinese woman tried to get her attention on her way, that instantly became more important than Penelope's own needs.
	The acrid aroma of Azar's feet cut through the scented butter that Penelope used to do her massage. It overpowered the peppermint scent, creating a truly repugnant olfactory blend that Penelope had to endure for the entire twenty minutes she spent doing the woman's massage. She had to endure it even after finishing with Azar too, because of the way it rubbed off on her uniform when the woman had the gall to use her as a human footrest.
	Is this why the Councilwoman was punishing her by re-assigning her to this foot parlor? At least at Lotus Nails, they had the pedicure bowls to wash clients' feet before starting the service. Here, Penelope was just going to be exposed to sweaty, dirty feet with nothing more than peppermint butter to protect herself.
	Gloves were out of the question at this job. In addition to being an unnecessary expense, they were also seen as being unflattering to the client. There was a certain visual statement about a white woman rubbing feet with her bare hands; it underscored the message that the Eastern women were so perfect that a person wouldn't want gloves to get in the way of touching someone so beautiful.
	A Chinese doctor would wear gloves when touching a white patient; that was the sort of occasion that called for them.
	Each of the Arabic women gave Penelope 5-star reviews. The special noise that played on her smartwatch made her smile until she understood that she would need to give every future client such good service – there could be no slacking off no matter how tired she got.
	On her way to her next client, she was struck by how different the customers were compared to the employees. The Chinese clientele were all smiles: they had expansive, relaxed body language and prided themselves on looking unhurried. They chatted happily to each other like they were at a nice party, sighing as they received decadent beauty treatments. Hannah was right: for them, this was a private lounge where they could swan about, having their most stringent demands met with a frightened, obsequious nod.
	By contrast, each of the employees looked harried and overworked – often glistening with sweat and bearing a weary expression. Each one dressed like a Roman courtesan, except for the anachronistic smartwatch on her wrist dictating how long she should spend massaging the client's feet. For the white girls, this was a den of iniquity where they had no rights, no protections, and no choice but to work their hands to the bone for imaginary points on a digital ranking system.
	Penelope did many more foot massages that day. A few stood out:
	One was on a particularly well-to-do lady with straight black hair and narrow almond-shaped eyes. Right away, this woman differentiated herself from the other clients by asking her name.
	"Penelope, Miss," she responded as she knelt before the woman to begin her massage.
	"I am Da-Xia. Nice to meet you."
	Unsure how to continue the conversation, Penelope just worked in silence. Everyone else had preferred it that way. Da-Xia had porcelain-white feet, with narrow little toes and small nail beds polished, and a girly pink pedicure. She cleared her throat.
	"I supported the Council's recommendation to give white women two more holidays each year," she lady said, "I was really sad it didn't pass. You work so hard! You definitely deserve it."
	"Thank you, Miss!" Penelope replied.
	She knew that part of the job was sensing the client's emotional needs and doing her best to fulfill them through polite conversation. In Penelope's world, this was called 'emotional labor' or emotional pampering; the idea that a service worker's responsibilities went beyond merely providing a treatment. She was expected to conform to her client's expectations of how a conversation should unfold. Flattering the lady, when appropriate – making her feel important and appreciated even if she was being a demanding brat in reality.
	So in this world of slavery, Penelope was expected to act grateful that one rich woman had made a nominal effort on her behalf – an effort that didn't amount to anything, in the end! It provoked within her the same feelings as she experienced when she was made to eat scraps from beneath Lai Fu's table. But just like then, now she had to play along.
	Da-Xia smiled.
	"You don't have to thank me," she said, "like I said: white women are very hardworking.. For the most part. If it were up to me, you would have two days off every week!"
	Penelope bit her cheek. Did this pampered, bourgeois woman seriously think that a two day weekend would address the staggering inequality everywhere else between whites and Chinese?
	"Wow! That would be very generous, Miss," Penelope responded, pretending that Da-Xia had impressed her with her liberal sympathies.
	 Da-Xia's smile widened.
	"My maid is white, my driver is white, I feel like I spend all my time with white people! I enjoy it."
	'Like having friends who always have to agree with you and do whatever you say,' Penelope thought as she smiled and laughed at Da-Xia's 'witty' remark.
	She wondered why a Chinese lady would fill her life with those types of relationships, but it didn't surprise her. Da-Xia enjoyed living in this fantasy world where her servants were genuinely happy to serve her, and they looked up to her with pleasant admiration. Would she even care if she learned otherwise? Could she be convinced that these weren't her willing friends, but slave girls who played along with her desires in order to avoid getting the horsewhip? That if the whipping did not come from Da – Xia, who generally opposed corporal punishment, it would come from a less 'modern' lady when she fell into a poor mood?
	In the back of her mind, Penelope was concerned that Niko would seek her out here the entire time she was at work. She decided that Niko had probably been kicked out of the People's Council.
	There was a constant stream of customers all day long. Women who had walked miles in the heat wearing high heels would sigh as they kicked them off to, getting a delightful foot massages on their frequent coffee breaks. For Penelope, this job was not relaxing whatsoever: her hands and the muscles in her forearms burned with use. By the sixth hour, she desperately wanted to be re-assigned to a different task that would let her rest her arms for a while, but settled for a lunch break.
	"Hurry back," the woman at the front desk told her.
	She found that Jessa was in the supply / break room.
	Jessa was sitting on a plastic box, wearing a midriff-baring pink toga, drinking her lunch shake. She had wavy blonde hair and green eyes, and she was frowning most the time.
	There was a broadcast screen, showing one of the news and announcement programs. Penelope watched along.
	Apparently, the Council had improved their camera system and were launching a new campaign requiring white women to smile more often. From now on, certain doors wouldn't open unless the woman gave it a good smile. They were integrating this technology into privately-owned camera systems too, so that employers could make sure their workers were smiling more often.
	Jessa didn't say anything negative about the program. History, for white women, consisted of an endless slew of mandates like this one. Each step was uncomfortable, pushed the envelope a little bit further, built on existing momentum.
	Penelope saw the sign they would start putting up to tell people to smile. It looked like a cartoon smiley face she was familiar with, and its eyes were narrow and more Asiatic. Penelope knew that this was yet another thing she could be found guilty of doing, then she could be punished for it. How would things ever change if the white woman could never get enough money or political power to even address the fact that they were a permanent underclass? When the best allies they got were women like Da – Xia who just talked about changing small things, but not anything too big, or too sudden, or that would offend people, or...
	By the end of her shift, Penelope's hands were very sore. She at least had Di Columbus, a potential escape from this place. How did the other white women put up with this sort of thing, day in and day out? She figured that she should ask women about the other countries of the world. So far, she knew that the New Kingdom was a bad place to be a white girl. But maybe another country would be better? How had France held up, or the United Kingdom? Maybe the New Kingdom wasn't a beacon for immigrants, here.
	Maybe it was the place to flee from.