The dark underbelly of car culture is already making an appearance in China Dogging (the act of having relations of a sexual nature within an automobile). Dogging has long been a Western past time, but in recent years dogging hit the mainstream in China with it often being reported on by the Chinese media and often talked about in online forums and chat rooms. As per usual, Chinese have come up with a simplified but awesome name for the act, it is simply called Che Zhen which could be roughly translated as Car Quake and Doggers (those taking part in the act) are simply referred to as Car Quake Tribe (Che Zhen Zu). Any casual observer of Hollywood movies over the past four decades would have you believe that North American teenagers are regularly bumping uglies in the trunks of their cars, whilst over the pond in the UK dogging has become so mainstream that its practically a dinner table conversation topic, in Southern Europe practically everyone under the age of 50 owes their life to their parents getting frisky in the back of a Renault 5 or a Fiat 125.
Chinese media have been quick to point out the top car quake spots in various cities, this page shows Qingdao’s own top spots, this Shanghai based driver was kind enough to drive around the city and put forward his own dogging spots complete with evidence of previous visitors (Di Shui Lake in Pudong Xin Qu, if you’re interested!), in Beijing Bei Qing Road seems to be a hotspot and Bai Yun Shan in Guangdong are all listed online as being ‘good sites’ for getting some automotive action going, some online posts even go into detail regarding the amount of shade available and the times that security guards carry out their security rounds. From preliminary research it appears that Hangzhou is not only one of China’s most livable cities, but also a top dogging city with plenty of suggestions coming from netizens as to the best places in town to rock your cars suspension.
Doing the no pants dance inside automobiles is not just limited to regular people, several high profile celebrities have also been caught in the act within their cars, of course these became known as ‘Che Zhen Gates’ (with -gate being added to any sort of shocking news in China). One of China’s top directors, Gu Zhang Wei was caught by Southern Daily journalists in 2009 getting his jig on in Beijing’s suburbs with an unnamed lady. Mr. Gu was sensible enough to choose a suitable vehicle with a Mercedes Viano MPV which no doubt provided plenty of room for various positions. Chinese basketball player Sun Rui was also caught with his pants down with a mysterious young lady in a Mercedes GL SUV, of course the Chinese internet went wild with such news.