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Money and marriage are modern China’s twin obsessions and would-be brides had their chance to pursue both in Shanghai at the weekend.As they boarded a square-rigger decked out in pink balloons dubbed “the millionaires’ love boat”, they braved not only prurient onlookers and rain but the unseen men, selected for their wealth, who had picked them in advance from a catalogue.
The event was a match-making cruise for the rich only, a first even for China’s new capitalism, and all 50 participants were granted anonymity by the organisers to save the face of any who might be rejected.
But one entrepreneur, who gave his name only as Mr He, agreed to speak, saying he had decided that at the age of 40 it was time to settle down and find a wife.
“My mother and my sister have tried to introduce me to girlfriends,” he said. “But the problem is, if I don’t like them it means lost face for their families, and that causes difficulties for mine.”
It has taken the end of communism for a revolution in love and marriage to sweep China. Mr He’s mother would argue for the traditional approach, whereby matchmaking was conducted by families.
While things changed when the Communist Party came to power, the difference often was that party officials decided. Even until 2003, couples had to get permission from their “work unit” to marry or divorce.
Now many seek romantic love. But, as the middle classes pursue a post-communist dash to prosperity, many are finding that they have sped from the age of arranged marriages straight to that of Bridget Jones with nothing in between.
“My mind was very clear — I wanted to establish my business, then to set up my family and, only then, to find a wife,” Mr He said. He and his family live between their home city of Guangzhou, in southern China, Hong Kong and San Francisco.
The “love boat” was the idea of Xu Tianli, who runs a high-end dating agency and the home page of whose website, 915915.com, is headed with the single English word “wealth”. The numbers 915 are a Chinese pun on the words “only want me”.
Men booking for the cruise had to be worth two million yuan — about $350,000. Most had 10 times that, putting them easily among China’s half a million estimated dollar millionaires. Women had to be both exceptionally pretty and have a university degree.
As they sailed out of Shanghai, the lucky few mingled, dined by candlelight or retired to private rooms for one-on-one discussion. The fee was a hefty $5000 but that included a year’s membership of the agency and, of course, free entry for three members of the opposite sex chosen from the company’s books.
Most of the millionaires doing the choosing were men but some were women. “I am already a member, and have found a target,” Miss Lu, who owns a manufacturing business and arrived in a white BMW, said. “But here I have one more chance to look at the field.”
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