Qixia Road near Novotel Atlantis
I'm staying in the Novotel Atlantis this week (Corner of PuDong Rd and Fushang Rd.). It's the third time I've stayed in this hotel so I've gotten to know the area quite well, and it's a fairly easy walk to Si Yuan from here. There's something in this area that I've always been curious about though. Hoping someone can enlighten me.
Across the street is a narrow alley called Qixia Rd. It's lined on both sides with small shops, restaurants, etc. Within a 1 - 2 short block area there are about 8 or 9 small massage shops. They advertise their prices outside in English. Most say something like "full body massage with oil 100 RMB / hour. A couple of them have signs saying something like "massage to your hotel room. " I'm not sure I'd call them BBS. I know the BBS scene but these look different as they don't have spinning poles or any barber chairs. They all appear to be quite small and have 2 - 4 bored looking girls sitting on couches trying to wave me in as I walk by. The vast majority of them are not attractive at all, but I was window shopping tonight out of the 20 or so girls I saw there were 2 or 3 who were young and very pretty. My little head wanted me to go into one shop when a pretty, nicely dressed, young girl was motioning for me to come in, but my big head intervened and said I'd better do my research first.
Now I've been around China a bit so I'm not naive enough to think I'll get much with a decent looking girl for 100 RMB, so I'm sure there's some kind of upsell involved, but can anyone tell me more about these places and whether it's worth searching for a diamond in the rough here, even with lower expectations than normal? I'm thinking even if they upsold me a bit and I had some fun with one of the girls I saw, it might not be a bad thing to try for once. What do all of you Shanghai experts think? Is it worth a shot or will I regret walking into one of those places?
Also, since those places are so tiny and probably not very clean, I'm assuming they'll push the takeout, which I may be fine wth. The thing s I have colleagues staying in this hotel with me so I don't want to come walking in with one of the girls wrapped around me. Would they understand if I say please come up 5 minutes later?
Thanks in advance for any feedback.