Love is never easy and to Zhao Kunming (趙昆明) it came harder than most. Three times, the military officer asked for permission to marry. Three times the answer was no.
“My work was very secret — researching missiles and rockets — so everyone introduced to me had to be seriously checked,” the 73-year-old explains.
“If they were involved with landlords or bureaucrats from the old days, it was not allowed. There were a few people I had nice relationships with, but the Communist Party stopped us,” he said.
Finally, his superiors let him wed a young soldier, Xie Yuqin (謝玉琴). Four decades on, they are “very satisfied” with their marriage and still staunch Party members. In retirement, they have found another way to serve the people — setting up a free matchmaking service.
You might assume Zhao envies members of the younger generation, able as they are to pick and choose. But the 8,000 singletons on his files — from factory workers to company bosses — can attest that personal emancipation does not guarantee happiness.
China’s breathtaking pace of social change across six decades has left many bewildered as well as liberated, with an ever-expanding range of options but few safety nets. The advance of capitalism has brought soaring inequality and dismantled the country’s common sense of purpose.
Relationships between parents and children, husbands and wives, friends and neighbors and families and the wider community, have changed. This transformation raises questions about people’s values and their understanding of love and duty. But it also creates immense practical challenges for individuals, households and — multiplied hundreds of millions of times — the state. Who, for instance, will pay for and care for elderly people?
Until 2003, your work unit had to approve your marriage — or divorce. At one stage, it might even have helped you find a partner. As late as the 1990s, your job was assigned, not chosen. A little further back and your friendships could be judged unsuitable, while your choice of clothing or music or reading matter was minimal.
Changing habits eroded the rules and led to their repeal. But as China embraces personal freedoms, it sees the same problems as the West, from the isolation of urban residents to increasing mental illness.
“Freedom and choice come hand in hand with responsibility and risk,” said Yan Yunxiang (閻雲翔), author of the forthcoming book The Individualization of Chinese Society. “Individuals have to take more responsibilities and work harder for personal interests with much less protection and support from the collective.”
Each weekend, Zhao and his wife leave their modest apartment lugging heavy sacks of papers and catch the bus across town to Bijiashan park. There they string out posters on lines between the trees, like washing: page after page of tiny characters covering clients’ names, ages, heights, weights, education, hometowns, jobs and marital status.
Some weeks see more than 1,000 lonely hearts, but thunderstorms are forecast today so it’s a quiet afternoon. Just a few scores of clients scan the sheets. Some drift past with studied indifference; others frown over them, notebook and pencils in hand.
A Hong Kong woman in a houndstooth jacket is fazed by the etiquette of introductions. In her 40s, she last dated some time ago.
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