“Double-Happy” Cigarettes: a pricy puff

On his way back home to China, a friend of mine sat down and had a cigarette with me. We each smoked one of his fancy, gold-filtered “Double Happy” Chinese-brand cigarettes. SHUANGXI...WU YE SHEN...RED-DOUBLE HAPPY cigz. According to my friend, this was a very expensive brand: gold and red packaging evokes tradition, high status, and good luck
The brand is culturally iconic for the Chinese..as well as one of their most expensive brands, with packs costing over 100$-in USD These Chinese cigarettes have a Bit of interesting history behind them...They were the favorite brand of a famous 'Madame' Liu.. who provided beautiful girls to politicians in Beijing...The girls were instructed to always carry a pack of Wu Ye Shen cigarettes when they visited clients. The reason behind this is the stuff of legend. As it turns out, each pack of WYS cigs was carefully adulterated by Madame Liu with special Chinese herbs; when smoked by the clients, they were left semi-impotent in a matter of minutes. Thusly embarrassed, the clients were eager for re-visitations by those same girls to 'prove' their manhood. Needless to say, this led to endless frustration. Madame Liu became rich in a short matter of time and is said to have bought her way out of China. She is now retired in a quiet bedroom community in Golden, Colorado.