槟榔西施约有数千人
报导说，这些槟榔西施（betel nut beauty）的人数可能多达数千人，她们的做法使男性顾客开心，令女性团体谴责、卫生专家责难，也让想要了解「槟榔文化」的社会学者钻研。
报导说，槟榔有助於抑制饥饿、清新口气，但它也有负面作用，会导致红齿、流口水、行人道满布红色污点，以及令人罹患口腔癌。
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「洛杉矶时报」22日专题报导台湾的槟榔西施文化。
现代西施充满自信
对於国外媒体的报导，访谈过300多名槟榔西施的台湾女性现代艺术协会会长吴琼华表示，槟榔西施是台湾社会特有的产物，早期槟榔西施畏畏缩缩，现在则充满自信。
吴琼华博士专研调查
拥有美国洛杉矶普林顿大学艺术学研究所博士学位的吴琼华，1995年起投入台湾槟榔西施议题研究与调查，也从事以槟榔西施为主题的艺术创作与展览，作品在国内外屡获邀展，去年曾在法国展出。
部分西施重拾课本
也热心辅导槟榔西施的她说，300多个接触个案中，经追踪有21人重拾书本念大学，有近10人自己转行创业开服饰店、花店，不过也有人转往酒店等场所工作。
牛牛，台南市槟榔西施∶清白工作赚钱
自己清白工作赚钱，家人也未反对，不用太在乎别人异样眼光。这个工作和同侪比较起来，不辛苦，工作稳，还有奖金和年终，加起来比其他服务业好很多。唯一讨厌的是少数客人的骚扰，但我们都有自己的因应之道，避免吃亏。知道外国媒体对槟榔西施很好奇，觉得很欣慰，也希望获得更多国人的肯定。
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雅莉，南投槟榔西施∶只想养家糊口
哇！我们怎麽登上外国媒体版面了？还好这次是对槟榔西施的正面报导，要不然可能又会引起困扰，毕竟我们只想养家糊口。卖槟榔的底薪是9000元，如果业绩好，1个月可赚近3万元，没有年终奖金、过年还要排班，有时还有奥客骚扰，但在不景气的今天，我已很满足。
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-betel-beauty22-2009jan22,3,2780234.story
Taiwan's 'betel nut beauties' drum up business, and debate
By Mark Magnier
January 22, 2009
Reporting from Taipei, Taiwan -- Lee sits on a bar stool in a plexiglass box near a highway offramp in central Taiwan. It's late afternoon and the 29-year-old is dressed in a red negligee, a fake rose planted firmly between her breasts.
"I work from noon to midnight, and it's psychologically tiring," she says. "Furthermore," she adds, pointing to her husband a few yards away, "he takes all the money."
Before you jump to conclusions, she isn't selling her body. In fact, she's using her body to sell . . . a spicy, addictive snack called betel nuts.
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Lee, who doesn't want to give her first name, is a "betel nut
beauty," one of thousands of women along Taiwan's highways hawking
the date-like fruit of the areca palm to truckers and other mostly
working-class customers.
The practice has been cheered on by male customers, condemned by feminist groups, decried by health professionals and pored over by sociologists keen to understand the island's "betel nut culture." But the aggressive sales tactics are credited with jump-starting a ho-hum industry: Betel nuts have supplanted sugar cane as Taiwan's second-largest crop, after rice.
Chewed widely in parts of Southeast Asia, India, Pakistan and the South Pacific, the betel nut is a stimulant popular as a hunger suppressant, breath freshener, tobacco substitute or simply for getting a mild buzz. Then there's the downside. Chewing betel nuts, which gives a kick akin to cigarettes, can lead to red-stained teeth, drooling, red-splotched sidewalks and oral cancer.
The betel nut's distinguished history dates to China's Six Dynasties period (220-589), when it was a treasured gift for royalty. In more recent years, Taiwan has moved this royal indulgence decidedly down-market. Now you can get betel nut soap, betel nut liquor, even betel nut chicken feed.
But the main show is roadside -- a cheap thrill, given that packages sell for a dollar or two.
"Basically, men are randy," says taxi driver Cheng Chunho, dipping into a plastic bag of "Hi Class Beetle Nut Crispy & Tasty." "I don't even like the stuff. But after a long day of driving, buying it provides a bit of excitement."
Suggestively dressed women in neon boxes on lonely highways would spell serious trouble in most countries. But attacks are rare, a fact sociologists attribute to Taiwan's relatively nonviolent, reserved culture.
Outsiders often assume the industry is a cover for prostitution. Although some cases may exist, experts say, doing 12-hour shifts in a glass box isn't exactly conducive to "the world's oldest profession," which is amply served by the island's many barber shops and escort services.
"Everyone has preconceived notions, but they're not necessarily true," says Tobie Openshaw, a photographer who has chronicled this salacious but socially accepted world. "They are underdogs, misunderstood, real people with real dreams."
Most stands feature glaring neon lights and a large mirror designed to draw attention to the women. Not exactly subtle, but it stops traffic. At which point the women teeter to the curb in their high heels, bend into the car window suggestively and hand over a couple of packets of betel nuts and a plastic cup for drivers to spit into.
Many of the women recruited by the booth owners are dropouts, single parents or runaways from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, says Christian Wu, an artist and scholar, named the unofficial "Minister of Betel Nut Beauties" by Taiwan's Art Critic magazine for her long-standing work with the community.
"The average age is 14 to 17," Wu says. "By 20, you're often too old."
The businesses are legal, but many are owned by gangsters who bribe police to alert them of pending raids, allowing them to hide underage workers. Where women once faced pressure from heavy-handed owners, a commission system now puts more of the onus on the women to decide how they want to dress, allowing some to earn upward of $50,000 a year. This has prompted a debate in Taiwan's academia over whether they are being empowered or exploited.
Current and former betel nut beauties say owners give new recruits some basic tips on what to wear and how to act -- let your hand linger when passing off the nuts, wear an oversized bra, smile, wave at motorists -- but ultimately the women develop their own style.
Competition can get particularly fierce, especially in summer, when harvests mean there's more to sell. But selling is about more than just looks.
"If a new girl with a beautiful face shows up but she's stupid, there isn't much competition," says one seller who left the industry and keeps her past a secret. "But there are a fixed number of drivers coming by. And if she's got good sales skills, she can steal away 50% of the business."
The exact origin of betel nut beauties is a matter of some debate. A recurrent story has it that somewhere around Nantau in central Taiwan in the early 1990s, two good-looking young sisters started selling the nuts on the roadside, wearing sleeveless outfits. That led to far better sales than their older, more homely competitors, and spurred copycats.
n 1997, artist Wu traveled to the area looking for the sisters. "But wherever I went and asked, everyone there claimed they were the original beauties," she says.
As the industry has become more successful -- by some estimates earning hundreds of millions of dollars annually and employing 2.5 million people -- it has drawn more critics and calls for regulation.
"There used to be a lot more betel nut girls," a seller in the city
of Gueijen says between trips to the curb, dressed in a tiny black
bikini with a gold belt. "But two years ago the police started
cracking down on us for wearing too little."
Health concerns have also grown: Oral cancer cases in Taiwan rose to 4,750 in 2004 from 1,790 in 1994, an increase the government blames on betel nut use. A study by the World Health Organization in 2003 linking betel nut use to cancer prompted island health officials to campaign against its use and call for health warnings on packages. Today, some bags have warnings, but because distributors do their own packaging, the rule is not always enforced.
Beyond the health considerations, social critics complain about moral implications.
"There's an element of treating women like toys," says Wang Julu, a sociologist at National Tsing Hua University.
Others, however, counter that condemning the trade is a bit hypocritical given that scantily clad women sell things everywhere, including designer clothes on runways.
"These things exist in any society," says Hwang Shu-ling, a sociologist at Taipei's National Defense Medical Center. "After all, the U.S. has topless bars. The thing that makes Taiwan's betel nut industry different is that it's more extreme and it's all out in public."
Jane Ke, 33, a high school teacher, says she's not particularly offended if the women wear tight clothes. "I wouldn't dream of sitting in a glass booth in my bathing suit, but those women have their financial concerns," she says. "It's their own choice, and I'm sure they work hard."
Lee in the Taipei suburbs says many of her competitors wear far less than she does. "I don't show my sensitive bits," she says. "Even then, men sometimes yell at you. And some are psycho, even exposing themselves. When that happens, I just curse at them and try to tell them not to embarrass themselves."
All the gawking can also create safety problems. "Guys are so busy looking, they crash," taxi driver Cheng says.
But in some cases, the women call 911 to report the crash, says Wang, the sociologist.
"So while they cause the accident, they also help alleviate the damage."
mark.magnier@latimes.com