Santiago shots | Music | 00:00 |
Men in suits | MARK CORCORAN: At first glance there's really nothing to dispel Chile's socially conservative image. | 00:11 |
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"Coffee with Legs" shopfronts | MARK CORCORAN: But look a little harder and you notice dozens of unusual shopfronts strangely out of place in this sombre city. | 00:22 |
Men in suits Men in suits | Here, businessmen don't like their coffee served with sugar. They want it with legs. | 00:31 |
"Coffee with Legs" interior | Music | 00:39 |
| MARK CORCORAN: And the place for that morning caffeine hit is a new Chilean institution - the Café con Piernas, meaning Coffee with Legs. | 00:45 |
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| MARK CORCORAN: It's like stepping into a strip joint at nine o'clock in the morning. | 00:59 |
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| MARK CORCORAN: Unashamedly sexist and exploitative and according to financial adviser and customer Patricio Fuentes Chilean men love it. | 01:13 |
| MARK CORCORAN: Why do you come to coffee with legs? | 01:25 |
Fuentes | FUENTES: because you have a very nice view here and also you can talk with your friends without almost everything. | 01:26 |
"Coffee with Legs" interior | Music | 01:33 |
| MARK CORCORAN: Coffee with Legs is unique to Chile. | 01:40 |
Men drink coffee | The cafes serve no alcohol or food mornings are the busiest time and they close at night. Keeping an eye on business is | 01:43 |
Pena | owner Marco Pena. MARCO PENA: In Chile, it's a very lucrative business you sell a lot of coffee and juice. | 01:54 |
Margerita | MARK CORCORAN: For single mother Margerita Perez it's a well paid job, | 02:04 |
Corcoran with Margerita | when jobs are scarce. MARK CORCORAN: Having to work all day basically wearing very, very little, does it bother you? | 02:08 |
| MARGERITA PEREZ: No, it doesn't bother me, it used to, but not anymore, you get used to it as if we were at the beach. | 02:15 |
Maria | MARK CORCORAN: What kind of guys go in there? MARIA SARROCA: All kinds of guys -- it could be my son or it could be my grandfather it's that big range of men, yeah. MARK CORCORAN: Maria Sarroca runs one | 02:25 |
Men on street | of Chile's most popular TV current affairs shows. | 02:36 |
Café Cubita exterior | She says the Coffee with Legs phenomenon can trace its origins back to the end of Chile's military dictatorship in 1990. | 02:39 |
Maria. Super: Maria Sarroca | MARIA SARROCA: After such a long dictatorship, people just felt like, wow, we are free, let's do -- we can do whatever we want , we can finally do it. | 02:49 |
Interior of Café with Legs | MARK CORCORAN: Maria Sarroca claims the cafes offer a release from a stifling conservative society. Divorce was only legalised here a couple of years ago. | 02:59 |
| MARK CORCORAN: Why do you and all the other Chilean women | 03:11 |
Maria | put up with this? MARIA SARROCA: Well, because I think it's an empowerment. I think it's a way to say I can do whatever I want and I can, I can If I want to serve coffee in a place like this, why not? | 03:14 |
Corcoran with Fuentes | MARK CORCORAN: What do your wives and girlfriends say? FUENTES: Ah, that's a very tough question. MARK CORCORAN: What's the answer? FUENTES: Because it's difficult to say. I come here to drink coffee with beautiful girls and she doesn't know. | 03:26 |
Ext. Coffee with Legs Bar | MARK CORCORAN: What about the wives - these places are full of | 03:46 |
Maria | married men? MARIA SARROCA: Yeah, well that's because there's a there's a funny saying that says well, I'm not happy but at least I'm married and that how most, many women feel, although they don't control their men, they prefer not to know. MARK CORCORAN: That's a Chilean philosophy? MARIA SARROCA: Yes, it is. | 03:49 |
Girls in Coffee with Legs Bar | MARK CORCORAN: And if Coffee with Legs works for men why not for Chile's equally repressed women? MARK CORCORAN: I'm told there was one started up for women with men serving? | 04:07 |
Corcoran with Fuentes | What happened? FUENTES: It doesn't work, because women they don't come in, only men. The gay men went to the coffee. | 04:18 |
Girl talking with patrons | Music | 04:27 |
| MARK CORCORAN: It's all about marketing a fantasy. But despite the altruistic spin, this is no community service. These businesses may also engage in the world's oldest profession. MARIA SARROCA: I know that not only do they sell coffee - | 04:33 |
Maria | but the girls I'm sure they sell themselves and I'm sure the owners know that. | 04:49 |
Pena | MARCO PENA: I manage the girls within specific hours, outside of those hours I don't know what each of them does. | 04:55 |
Montage in bar | Music | 05:02 |
| MARK CORCORAN: Marco Pena now has plans to go global. Use the security cameras to beam the action live, online, to subscribers around the world. | 05:12 |
| MARCO PENA: The plan I have at the moment is to broadcast the café via internet, that's what everyone's doing around the world. | 05:23 |
Pena | MARK CORCORAN: So Virtual coffee on legs? MARCO PENA: Café Virtual, yes, that's the word, Café Virtual. | 05:31 |
Tip jar | Music | 05:36 |
| MARK CORCORAN: And out there in the virtual world you never know whose wife may be watching. | 05:42 |
Credits: | Reporter : Mark Corcoran Camera: David Martin Sound: David Verrecchia Producer : Vivien Altman | 05:54 |