No love for Chinese urban women.

I use the Description "China Girl" for this topic it cold also have been china Boy, because they both have the problem, but I choose China Girl, because the article is about a young woman.

A big problem in China is finding a husband/wife, because the Chinese people have so many conditions to a partner, so it is very difficult for them to find one. The normal way in China is that the parents - friends or family find what they think is a suitable husband/wife for the person. When they choose this "partner" they first look at his/her social status and then what is his/her job and salary and then does HE have a house

( in the west an apartment - Flat ). They do not consider Love at this point and just hope that love may come later, so to me it is just like a business agreement.

In China, there are 50 million men in excess ( because of the Son preference ), the men are still not ready for a higher educated and thus higher paid partner. The result is a growing group of hard working single women who are caught between their dreams of career and romantic love and parental - family - friends expectation of an honourable marriage.

Here is thousand and thousands of small shops where these single people register to find a husband/wife they usually pay 50-75 Yuan -$ 9-14 to register and then some more for a referral and that referral is often a friend or family member of the shop owner who just meet the potential husband/wife and of course there are no match.

Most of these single people still live with their parents even when they are 35-40 years old. Another problem is that if they get married then very often the Husbands Mother try to run their home and mingle in everything

very often the newly wed wife is being criticised by her mother in law for not looking properly after her son ( these sons are like emperors) and the husband does not support his wife in many of these cases, so that is one of the reasons for the escalating divorce rate in China today!

Another way these singles ( many of them 35-40 years ) try to find a partner is by doing the following

29-year-old Xuemei Shi is with his father in People's Park in the centre of Shanghai. They push their way tru the crowd to get to what , it's all about: the hundreds of fluttering A4 pages which are attached to bushes and clothes lines with clothes pins.

The many papers are CVs for unmarried men and women at Xuemeis age and older . Resumes as parents of the unmarried have hung up, hoping to get their adult children well married.

• See him here, says Xuemeis father and began to read aloud:

• He works for a good company. Has own apartment. Good!! write his phone number down.

But Xuemei competition is fierce. In the park are the unmarried women in the majority, and although the national average is just over 50 million men in excess, have well-educated women like Xuemei trouble finding a boyfriend. Actually there are a growing group of educated, highly paid single women in china today.

The men lose face ( this loosing face thing is a very big problem here in China ), if he marries a woman who is better educated or earn more money than he does. On top of that Xuemei does not have the time of world- time is running out. The older she gets, the harder it is to find a husband.

Men marry down and women up

Earlier this year, China's state-owned news agency reported that the number of single women over 25 for the first time, rounded half a million - in the capital Beijing alone. Universities around China suggests a similar trend in the rest of the country's major cities: in Guangdong Province, for instance, 300,000 unmarried women over 30 to 200,000 unmarried men.

Cecilia Milwertz, senior scientist and China expert at the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies at Copenhagen University, concedes that it sounds paradoxical to the women's singles problems in a country with 50 million more men than woman. But the explanation is fairly simple:

• There are two large unmarried population in China. It is the educated urban women and the poor men in the country. The men marry all the time with some with lower education. So there's enough women, until we reach the poorest men - they do not get married. Today some of these poor farmer workers buy a wife in Vietnam ( they save many years for this )

So it is not always a good idea to flaunt woman training or pay. You know Xuemeis father. In People's Park, he and Xuemei met a woman who tries to sell her son. She has photos and talks about his job at an international hotel.

And then she would like to know what Xuemei salary was.

• It is perfectly fine with me. I can write it down, suggests Xuemei and takes a block up of her bag.

• If you write too much, he will not meet with you, warns her father. He laughs, but looks serious, as he continues:

• Maybe you should not write it. Better not.

But Xuemei writes what her salary in the Bank is and show it to the woman who lifts his eyebrows.

• Being single, it's something unusual, something outside the norm. The woman do no choose this themselves , and when they are seen as deviants, if they are not married, it is difficult for them to live with, says Cecilia Milwertz.

The single life for the most educated can very well be a lifelong condition confirmed by the Shanghai Women Federation. In a survey of more than 500 men conceded just 7.6 percent that they would marry a woman with a higher education.

The small eye in the needle

Marriage is far from single women only ambition. The women have completely different opportunities to educate themselves and create a career than their mothers - and they exploit them. And when the women can support themselves, marriage is no longer an economic necessity. Suddenly there is room for dreams of romantic love and individual happiness. As Xubin Zhu, educator and business consultant in Chinese language and culture, puts it:

• In big cities we are approaching western conditions. In the country dominates the old traditions, but in the cities, young people will have modern, romantic love.

The romantic dreams must therefore be upheld and the man should at least have a higher salary. At the same time the parents' claims to the man's job, income, housing and so on are protected - and then the needle eye suddenly quite small.( business agreement)

It is also true for Xuemei:

• I myself am quite tolerant. But my parents do not accept everything: if he is drinking and smoking. Or play poker. Or go out with mates . I could really well accept the weaknesses Xuemei says. She pauses from CV-peeping on a bench while her father looking on.

• There are many factors that I will need to consider: What do my parents? What do my colleagues? What do my environment think?( not her own will, but every one else’s) amazing they put up with it!

The most important requirement: Money

Though neither the single women or their parents are forced to find a husband for economic reasons is money still the decisive factor for potential spouses. Money gives them the status and constitute a security, many of the parents missed this when they where young. As Xuemeis father puts it:

• Income is incredibly important for their future lives. Emotions can evolve gradually. But a steady income is a guarantee for their lives. It's the basics.

Xuemeis father is far from the only one that counts that income is more important than the romantic feelings. According to a survey conducted by the China Women's Federation sees three out of four a good economy as the most important attribute of a potential spouse. And the economic demands are high. For example Xuemeis father do not dream of approving a son in law who rent an apartment instead of owning it. Such is the tradition and has been in large cities, especially in Shanghai, Beijing Zhenzhen, ect where high property prices, thereby is making it even harder for urban women to be married.

• In large cities the girls' parents have much to say. They say to the son in law, that he should buy an apartment. The apartment represents a form of financial security, says China Consultant Xubin Zhu.

He also explains why it is more attractive for men to marry a newcomer woman from the country than someone who grew up in the city:

• It can be difficult for men to get an apartment. In the countryside it is just the reverse. There the girls parents don’t have so much to say. Rather than requiring anything, they pay a dowry to the husband's family.

Harder and harder for residual-women

And while parents are looking for potential spouses in People's Park and in their networks, approaching daughters in the sell-by date on the marriage market. The average Chinese woman gets married, when she is 24 years. If she is much older than 25 without finding a man, she's a nü sheng, a remnant woman. And it's certainly nothing attractive label.

In the larger cities, women are generally older than 24 when they get married. In Shanghai, the average age is as high as 29th But also in the cities, women have an expiration date. In a large survey conducted by researchers from Beijing Normal University would only 12.5 percent of surveyed men ever consider marrying a woman over 35

Xuemei know the problem, and she has lowered its expectations for a man before it's too late:

• My wish is hard to attain, so I have to lower my requirements, she explains.

• Now I'm 29, so I'll have to be realistic. For the sake of my parents, I had to compromise. But I still have not achieved what I wanted.

The men are traditionally older than women when they marry - both rural and urban areas. And according to the afore mentioned study by the University of Beijing women prefer men around 30 rather than the slightly younger models.

The credit is more important than Moving

Marriage market in Shanghai is not an isolated phenomenon. Generally, parents do a lot of effort to get their children married well - for example by arranging dates with colleagues, acquaintances and friends 'friends' children. There are several reasons for this. First, the career minded children - their working hours can easily be around 12 hours, not much time to even look for love.

• The Chinese are working hard and very long, and often they have much work. So they do not have much time to go out and very little networking outside work.

Parents Arranged dates - xiang qing - is still very common. Parents think it is unnatural and wrong, if children do not get married, says China Consultant Xubin Zhu.

At the same time, parents have generally had a lot to say. Although - at least in large cities - hardly able or willing to force their children into marriage, it is not unusual that they veto a candidate, the son or daughter take home. Xubin Zhu himself have experienced "almost being thrown out at home. ' He was dating a girl, his mother did not like. When he refused to break up, his mother did not speak to him a whole year.

Senior Cecilia Milwertz explains that women can be caught between their own needs and parents' expectations. Expectations that women may feel obligated to satisfy.

• Typical the parents expect a a grandchild. It is important to keep the family line on. It is typical that women feel obliged in that direction. It's a dilemma: Who should I make happy - myself or my parents? They have done so much for me. ' ( there is saying here in China : I’ll rather cry in a BMW than be smiling on a motorbike )

Tenacious traditions ... with changes on the way

As with so much else in China, marriage and family traditions in transition: marriage age increases. The dream of love and individual happiness has begun to affect the choice of partner. At the same time it has become easier to divorce and it is no longer forbidden to have sex or live together before marriage.

Although the change primarily are evident in the cities, this will also go to the country side people in the rest of China. Says Cecilia Milwertz:

• Young people in the city differs from the young people elsewhere. But their behaviour tells us about the developments that will come, a development in which young people is less guided by the parents, she predicts.

But there are still many bumps on the road to marital happiness for the well-educated, highly paid woman. Cecilia Milwertz explains that some of the women run into serious problems if they marry men with less pay:

• In women's organization circles denominator is often that women's higher education and wages is a part of the explanation for male violence against women, she says.

• The logic is that women come out of the norm of proper female behaviour by earning the most. The man becomes frustrated when he does not live up to a masculine norm that says he must be the one who earn most.

In People's Park the afternoon sun is shining on the middle-aged parents who are picking CVs down of shrubs, trees, clothes lines and are reflected in the sweat that trickles down over the forehead of Xuemeis father. It's hot, and they have been searching for over five hours now. The result: Two phone numbers. Two phone numbers that gives Xuemei hope for love and her father to think of grandchildren.

• Most importantly Xuemeis happiness, says the father. When your child is happy, you are even more happy. It is the most important thing.( but there is still all the conditions )

Many young Chinese today choose what they call " a naked Marriage " That is when they marry and just rent an apartment or Flat, because they love each other and can not afford to buy a "house"