Shanghainese people pay to 'lose face'

A country of people who hate to "lose face" is now spending millions on changing them. Finally we have an example with which to explain "irony" to a billion people.

Shanghaiist has several Chinese friends who have had the popular "double eye-lid" surgery, and it seems that they're not alone (this is an article in Chinese).

According to the statistics, every year over 1 million Shanghainese people have plastic surgery, and 20 percent of those need to be redone. Unsuccessful plastic surgery usually leaves the patient with psychological problems. Nose jobs, wrinkle-removals, breast jobs and chin jobs are the ones which go wrong most easily. Some people have high expectations of the result of the surgery. Therefore, if the surgery fails or the outcome is not the same as the expectation, patients usually become depressed, which then causes psychological problems.

The article goes on to give the example of Miss Wang, who thought her face was lop-sided. Not happy with her first op, she went on to spend over 20,000 RMB on four more operations, including a nose reduction (maybe the first Chinese person we have heard of who craves a smaller nose) and to create dimples on her face. She is now planning to narrow her waist with the removal of 2 ribs.

[S]ome plastic surgeons think that having an obsession of plastic surgery actually is kind of a mental problem. Their professional advice is that you should strongly consider your actions before you undertake plastic surgery, and make sure you choose a licensed hospital.

What sterling advice. They really earn their salaries don't they? Certainly not setting the best example was last year's "Mr. Ugly Contest", in which the winners won the "prize" of permanently altering their faces with non-guaranteeable surgery, something which most locals threw scorn at, just like the "Plastic Surgery Marathon" of 2003. In fact, there have been seemingly endless "man-made beauty contests" endorsed by the Chinese government. We have been wondering why this would be.

The government says China's cosmetic surgery industry took in $2.4 billion last year. China also has eagerly embraced the notion of beauty pageants and modeling contests. The southern Chinese beach resort of Sanya has hosted the Miss World pageant for two straight years and is to be the site of the event again next year.

Gotcha.