Looking for love: Cupid’s arrows aim at lovelorn
Print Edition
SUN Yaping is a 30-year-old entrepreneur who has a head for business. She also has a heart for love.
In addition to the company she owns in Songjiang University Town, which organizes performing arts events and provides stage costume design, Sun also has become an ad hoc community matchmaker.
During an interview with Shanghai Daily, she was constantly interrupted by mobile phone calls and messages.
“Too many people are looking for me,” she said, with an apologetic smile.
Sun’s business, which she started in 2009 with help from a fund created to nurture budding entrepreneurs, created a wide circle of friends and associates. So it was hardly surprising that she became a cupid’s magnet for lovelorn singles and for parents desperate to see their children married.
“It’s indeed a tough task that I have undertaken,” Sun said of matchmaking. “But I was deeply touched when I looked into the eyes of anxious parents. I have never regretted trying to help them.”
Like the 82-year-old man who traveled more than one hour from the city center of Shanghai to the suburban Songjiang to ask for help in finding a husband for his 55-year-old widowed daughter.
Devotion to children
“It was March,” she said. “The weather was cold, but the old man was sweating when he arrived at my office after walking from the Metro station. I was quite moved by his devotion to his daughter.”
So-called “leftover” men and women — singles beyond the age when most people are married — have become a social issue in big cities like Shanghai. That is evident from the mass matchmaking events held with increasing frequency in the city and from the burgeoning number of for-profit matchmaking agencies.
But some of those seeking partners prefer the more informal, personal touch that Sun can offer. She doesn’t charge for her services.
In 2010, she launched a phone hotline and a QQ instant online messaging site for those looking for partners. Within two months, members soared to more than 100. Today Sun’s matchmaking database has reached more than 1,000.
Recruiting help from volunteers
As increasing numbers of people sought her help, Sun said she became overwhelmed. Matchmaking activities occupied all her spare time and then began encroaching on her working hours.
She finally was forced to recruit volunteers to help her. Now she has eight, all married people, who answer phones and jot down the personal information of applicants.
“I require all my volunteers to be married because then they have more experience in these matters and can be impartial,” she said. “I would worry that singles might have hidden agendas.”
In the past four years, she has successfully matched almost 20 couples who went to the altar. Others are engaged in serious relationships that may lead to marriage, she said.
“I do have a strong sense of achievement,” Sun admitted.
Sun said she is not impressed by mass matchmaking events, such as the annual “10,000 People’s Blind Dates Party.”
“People are not commodities,” she said.
Some matchmaking agencies exploit single women by charging high fees but enrolling men at no cost.
Sun said she suspects that some agencies intentionally set up blind dates doomed to fail in order to keep clients coming back.
“It’s not fair at all,” she said. “They are all earnest people and they don’t deserve this treatment.”
About 80 percent of Sun’s “clients” are women. Most, she said, are fairly good-looking, have good educations and decent jobs.
So what’s the problem? Sun said in some cases, Shanghai women hold unrealistic expectations about future husbands. They may worry too much about the size of bank accounts or sexual prowess in assessing possible partners.
Sun’s one rule is that women seeking her help must be Shanghai locals, while men need to have worked in the city for at least a year.
For men, she asks the question: “Do you have an apartment for marriage?” And for women, she asks: “Do you mind if the man doesn’t have the apartment?”
She and the volunteer helpers try to match people according to age, personality, family background, education, interests and hobbies.
Over the years, Sun has encountered all sorts of odd requirements, mostly from parents. Some made it clear that they won’t accept anyone from a divorced family. Some stipulated size requirements for an apartment, which is generally considered a prerequisite for men in marriage.
One mother flatly refused for her daughter to be paired with any man from northern Jiangsu Province because after a soured relationship with a man from that region.
Heart-to-heart talk
“Often I have to have a heart-to-heart talk with parents to try to get them to change rigid mindsets,” she said.
Sun still remembers the excitement of the first couple she introduced going to register for marriage.
“I was in extremely high spirits, as though I were getting married myself,” she recalled.
Her matchmaking efforts don’t exclude middle-age or older singles. Sun’s mother, Zhou Shanmei, has volunteered to help with that group.
“It is often hard for divorcees to get over the despair of separation and embrace a new life,” Zhou said. “But I am a teacher and have infinite patience.”
Sun said she is now looking for a venue where she can hold informal gatherings for people to meet people.
“I hope someone will realize the good we are trying to do and will offer us a spacious setting,” she said.
Sun’s hotline is 133-9110-3738 and her QQ site is 2512115575.
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