{"id":26216,"date":"2026-04-14T12:20:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-14T04:20:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/?p=26216"},"modified":"2026-04-14T12:20:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-14T04:20:09","slug":"a-hidden-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/2026\/04\/a-hidden-life\/","title":{"rendered":"A Hidden Life"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Underaged Compensated Dating – a form of prostitution involving young women who provide dating and sexual services in exchange for money or presents, remains a prevalent issue in Hong Kong<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Jovie Wong<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coming from a broken family and being cash-strapped, Ruomi Cheung has worked in \u201ccompensated dating\u201d offering companionship, and even sexual favours to older men in return for money and luxury gifts since she was 16.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now 18, Cheung reveals she has to do whatever it takes to escape from her family. Her parents are divorced, and her stepfather is abusive. The family owes more than HK$200,000 (US$25,525) in debt. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI must leave this sick place,\u201d she says, adding that she was bullied in school for  three years starting at age 13. Then she was transferred to the Vocational Training Council (VTC) and has continued her studies to this day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Living alone, Cheung says she has to make a living through compensated dating, since working as a maid cafe hostess and a bar hostess cannot make ends meet. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have to pay rent. It\u2019s hard to live in a metropolitan city as an 18-year-old girl,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
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Compensated daters meet clients in bars and clubs at Lan Kwai Fong<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Sharing her life as a part-time girlfriend on Threads has attracted many followers. She sells photos, videos, and even her underwear, and dates men who contact her via Instagram and Threads for \u201cRewards\u201d, usually money, sometimes luxuries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cI post pretty pictures of myself, and they\u2019ll come. It\u2019s so effortless,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI just have to post photos and wait for messages. Men pay me HK$150 (US$19) for 15 minutes of FaceTime, wearing shorts and a tight vest,\u201d she adds,  noting that it is not a small amount for a poor student who survives on only HK$250 (US$32) a week in living expenses from parents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThen people in the chat room offer HK$300 (US$38) for pulling down a bit of my vest, then HK$800 (US$102) for touching my breast when dating, then\u2026 more and more,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cheung earns about HK$300 (US$38) from selling underwear and HK$500 (US$64) from posting photos and videos. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAt first, I didn\u2019t realize I would go this far,\u201d says Cheung, adding that she later offers sexual services (limited to manual and oral sex) in return for HK$1,300 (US$166) or more. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

She also has a so\u2011called \u201csugar daddy\u201d, who covers all her expenses and gives her an extra HK$15,000 (US$1,914)  a month for her companionship and sexual services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI cannot resist such temptations, so I say yes to them,\u201d Cheung adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wong, another teenage compensated dater who mainly meets and serves clients in bars and clubs, thinks she was born for the job because of her love for drinking and high tolerance of alcohol.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
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Compensated daters are paid to attend social events and drink<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

 \u201cI knew I was made for this job,\u201d the 17-year-old girl says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Clients pay Wong to attend social events and fend off drinks for them. \u201cI don\u2019t need to do anything in those few hours, just drink. Then HK$2,000 (US$255) comes,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With a cigarette in her hand, a faint trail of smoke lingering in the air between words, Wong reveals she also comes from a divorced family. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have to live with my mom, but I cannot get along with her. Home is just a place to sleep,\u201d she says. Her mother gives her no extra money. The relationship between them is more like that of roommates. So she has to earn on her own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unsatisfied with earning HK$2,000 (US$255) for hours of drinking followed by headaches or nausea, she began offering sexual services to earn the same amount in 30 minutes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But she wants even more. She later becomes an agent, recruiting new girls into compensated dating. \u201cEvery time I introduce girls to jobs, I get extra commission. Now, I don\u2019t even have to work, and money keeps rolling in,\u201d she says, adding that she has made around HK$20,000 (US$2,553) in the past 20 days living on commission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tong Choi Chun, a social worker and founder of Ching Yin Centre, which mainly helps teenagers with special educational needs, says the economic factors are not the only reason why girls engage in compensated dating.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
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Terrence Tong, Social Worker Officer and founder of Ching Yin Center<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

\u201cEmotional needs, like not feeling loved and cared for, or being ignored or neglected by family, are also a strong factor,\u201d Tong says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Apart from money and luxury goods, Tong says special experiences that teenage girls can rarely encounter\u2013such as a client-service provider relationship that mimics father-daughter bonding is also a reason behind it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOver time, many girls grow emotionally attached and struggle to quit the industry,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tong says clients emotionally manipulate these girls, making them willing to meet any demand, even those close to sexual assault or violence, as long as the price is right. Many cases Tong has handled involve severe distress and depression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2015, the Department of Social Work and Social Administration at the University of Hong Kong conducted a telephone survey on participation in compensated dating in Hong Kong and found that only three percent of interviewees had ever engaged in compensated dating, but many social workers, including Tong, note that there are many unknown cases and not many girls seek help. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

To help these girls, Tong recommends combining financial education with personal growth programmes to help them understand their monetary value and develop a healthy self-perception.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Edited by Swara Kamble <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sub-edited by Jennifer Liu<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Underaged Compensated Dating – a form of prostitution involving young women who provide dating and sexual services in exchange for money or presents, remains a prevalent issue in Hong Kong By Jovie Wong Coming from a broken family and being cash-strapped, Ruomi Cheung has worked in \u201ccompensated dating\u201d offering companionship, and even sexual favours to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":26218,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2321,2322,8],"tags":[2328,33,205,1832,40,2327],"class_list":["post-26216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-issue-176","category-march-2026","category-our-community","tag-compensated-dating","tag-culture","tag-hong-kong","tag-social-work","tag-society","tag-underaged"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26216","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26216"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26216\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26242,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26216\/revisions\/26242"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26218"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}