China’s Sex Museum and Its History of Lotus Feet

Museum of the Month is a series where I share my experiences of visiting unique and often strange museums from around the world. My aim is to rebuff the notion that museums are boring. Join me on my quest!

Sometimes the world’s most extraordinary things are found in the world’s most unlikely places.

Who expected the remains of King Richard III to be found under a car park in Leicester? Or to find a cat sanctuary on the burial ground of where Julius Caesar was murdered?

This brings me onto the topic of my post: Who would expect to find an ancient sex museum in China, a place where the talk of sex is still largely taboo?

If someone had asked me that before going, I would have protested in disbelief. But I saw, I went, and I bought the T-shirt. This place is real.

If you’ve ever found yourself in a sex museum in Europe, you’ll soon discover that this one is different – thank goodness. Most of the ones in Europe are little more than a dungeon of desperation. All you respectable people will be pleased to know it’s a bondage-free, blow up doll-free and lads’ mag-free zone!

What this place has is a surprisingly quaint, but with just enough sauce ‘n’ spice for visitors to feel like they’ve got away with stealing a cookie from the cookie jar.  But first you have to get past the initial shock of the main statue by the entrance, standing loud and proud…

Toby and Lily pose with the beast.

What I like most about this museum is how it promotes a healthier relationship towards sex in Chinese culture. Under Mao’s regime sex was viewed solely for reproduction and viewing it as anything but was a cardinal sin. However, the clocks are now changing, and this museum celebrates it.

The museum is spilt up into several rooms covering different themes, from sex and evolution to sex in literature, and from sex in art to the sexual oppression of women. There are a wide range of sexual relics, many hundreds of years old, from chastity belts, sexual devices and erotic themed sculptures, tiles and paintings. My favourite was the sculpture garden for its surprisingly picturesque setting which contrasted against the very graphic sculptures…!

It  gets weirder…

One of the more interesting cabinets told the story of foot-binding, also known as lotus feet. This bizarre tradition is said to go back as far as the 10^th century and involves women having their feet painfully bound to prevent further growth all in the name of ‘beauty’. The ideal foot length at the time was three inches, and often toes would become displaced and crushed underneath the ball of the foot. Ouch.

How did this even become desirable? It was said that an Emporer became infatuated by the small feet of a ballet dancer after seeing her perform and that is where the tradition is said to have started. However, another theory is that Daji, a concubine of King Zhou, was said to have a clubfoot and asked the King to make footbinding mandatory for all girls so that her own feet would be the standard of beauty and elegance. Well, doesn’t she sound like a treat?

Women in upper class societies began binding their feet as a symbol of status but it worked its way down the lower classes and had horrific consequences. At least the women in upper societies did not need to work and could therefore rest their feet, but the women who had bound feet and who had to work resulted in excruciating pain and lifelong disabilities. It was not until the 20^th century, after repeated campaigns responding to women’s rights  and health did this barbaric tradition die out. However, as this short interview shows, the tradition still persisted in some areas after the 1911 ban.

The purpose of this museum is much less about cheap thrills, than it is about educating. I learnt loads about the history of sexuality in China and was astounded at how attitudes towards sex have changed over the years. It appears that China had quite a ‘colourful’ attitude towards sex but when Mao came into power sexuality was strongly discouraged, men and women wore androgynous military style clothing, and premarital sex could be punishable with sentences in concentration camps. However, if one seed of goodness came out of that period it was the banning of foot binding.

It’s only been in the last 20 years or so that the lid has begin to peel off China’s oppressive views on sexuality, but the important thing is that changes are happening.

Please note: I visited the Sex Museum when it was located in Tong Li near Suzhou, as of April 2014 it has relocated to the Hainan Province.