Dating in China is a broad subject in fast-changing times and can't be effectively covered in one post of mine. However, once I made good friends in Hengyang, they wanted me to stay - and the key to staying, obviously, involved marrying a local man. For a while, when I was dating Carl, the dream was within their reach. However, once we broke up, worry set in, and blind dates akin to job interviews began. This wasn't exactly the plan I had outlined for myself, but I tried to be open and see who I'd meet. If nothing else, I'd have better language skills and cultural insight. I was right about that. Here are some things I learned about the local dating culture:
In the beginning, it's a group sport. The social network is very important for meeting potential matches. It vets backgrounds, ensures seriousness on behalf of both parties, and acts as a buffer for awkwardness if the pair in question don't hit it off. This is true for everyone, but for me in particular - I was already approaching "old" when I came to China, and as a white girl with limited language skills and no local network, my prospects were limited. This means, in my case, that Kitty, some of her family and other friends, students' parents, and occasionally the school's Communist Party Representative introduced me to men and attended my blind dates.
I was supposed to be dressed and ready for a spontaneous introduction at any time. Kitty once criticized my choice of hairstyle and visual corrective aids as not being date-appropriate, when I didn't know I was going on a blind date until after we were in the car (I had been dressed for the weekly office meeting). It explained the seemingly over-the-top outfits that some of the younger teachers wore in class - age-appropriate fashion in lieu of situation-appropriate clothing, apparently. A woman's appearance is of vital importance, though a man's, of course, is not. Most of my dates dressed a little too casually (and a few had atrocious oral hygiene) and no one but me seemed to think of that as an issue.
If a man has money, a house, and a car to provide, the rest is just details. Heck, even Tom said he wished I'd ended up with the kidney surgeon because he liked his house (going native?). One of my favorite stories (now, anyway) is that, from our third/last date until after I had left China, one man kept sending me photos of the house and car he would buy me...along with a wedding spot scene by a lake with heart-shaped balloons. I had to block him. The only guy I really found handsome was self-conscious that his car wasn't good enough...and took me on a date to test drive nicer vehicles at a car dealership.
In dating and marriage, traditional Chinese men (and women, too) aren't so much looking for an individual who aligns well with them as someone who fills a prescribed societal role rather cleanly. If you're familiar with the 1950s, you can pretty much guess the roles. For example, most guys didn't seem to mind the fact that, in Chinese, I express myself like a five-year-old - "getting to know me" was a minor detail - but they did get confused if I had any ideas about where we should go or what we should do (they are supposed to bring gifts and pay for everything...and therefore make all the decisions). People speculate about why it's common to see Asian women with western men, but uncommon to see western women with Asian men. This is my hypothesis as to why.
Decisions about marriage are made very quickly. After every first "date," people started asking me about wedding bells (seriously). If I balked at all, they always wanted to know what was "wrong" with the guy. Things like "I just met him," "We don't share a common language," or "We don't have any common interests" were not satisfying answers. If I went on a second or third date, that was almost like an engagement. Some friends of mine (young Chinese women) met a guy, dated, planned a wedding, AND got married within the span of a year.
Statistics don't equal happiness. We all know the divorce rate in China is much lower than the divorce rate in the United States. However, this does not simply mean that Chinese couples have better marriages. It's important to note that love and personal happiness are not primary goals of marriage in China - they are potential by-products (regardless of cheesy pre-wedding wedding photos). I still laugh (and cringe) about the day a colleague walked into the office and doled out handfuls candy from her civil service the day before - without so much as a smile. It's not uncommon for Chinese people to get married simply to fulfill social expectations and belong to a group - and no matter what happens, they won't sacrifice their reputation and contacts by getting a divorce.
Needless to say, I did NOT get married in China. However, I am grateful that friends cared about my well-being enough to try and facilitate my love life, involvement that produced mostly positive, and always memorable, experiences. Of course, in spite of my mishaps and any frustrations listed above, there are plenty of happy Chinese couples, a decent amount of foreign guys happily married to Chinese women, and a small handful of foreign women happily married to Chinese men. 干杯 gan bei (cheers) to all of them!
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