Beijing Bunny Bar Fails to Impress

A former Maoist radical has launched Beijing's first bunny bar, but China's playboy revolution is already foundering.

In the 70s CK Yu, the son of a Taiwanese general, was running a bookshop in California selling the works of Mao Zedong.

But in a sign of how quickly values are changing in modern China the communist has turned entrepreneur and hired 15 young women (out of the 400 who applied) to dress up in fake ears, fluffy bottomed skirts and fishnet stockings.

Mr Yu's bar, Buck and Bunny, opened last Friday in Sanlitun, the capital's diplomatic district.

But the playboy pad is proving less than successful.

Apart from the police and cultural ministry officials who dropped in to warn that the skimpy uniforms were unacceptable, the bar has been almost empty.

Customers say it is hard to tell whether the club is behind or ahead of the times.

"It is the sort of place you could only get in Beijing," says Sami Sallinpaa, who claims to have dropped in by chance. "So many new bars try to copy something that they think is modern and western, but they often end up seeming odd and old fashioned."

Mr Yu hopes business will pick up, but his partners are already working on a Plan B. They are considering nightly games of bingo.