2008 Nov 11 11/11: Single's Day
For most Chinese youth, today's date has nothing to do with a far-away war that ended 90 years ago. In recent years, the repetition of the digit 1 in 11/11 has been taken by many as a good enough as an excuse as any to celebrate Single's Day or 光棍节 Guanggun Jie. To mark the occasion, various speed and blind dating events will be taking place across town while other singles will use the day to display their pride in their singledom.
However, according to a poll that is getting a lot of coverage in today’s papers, more and more people (especially young professionals) are wishing that they didn’t have to celebrate the special day anymore. The results, of what was no doubt a highly-suspect and totally unscientific poll conducted by zhaopin.com, revealed that men want to be married by the time they are 30 and 62.1% of respondents thought that women should be getting married before they’re 28. The poll results also indicated that 70% of single professionals are worried about their single status and yearn to find a partner. The poll also revealed a drop in the number of people who would never consider going on a blind date. In a sign of growing desperation, only 5.9% of respondents said they would never go on a blind date down from 9% last year.
Highly restricted match-making fairs are another indication of how difficult it’s becoming to find a partner in the capital. Last month a match making fair held in Haidian Park required all attendants to produce their personal ID, copies of their academic qualifications and work ID just to get in the gate. The strict rules were to ensure that all attendees held a Beijing hukou, were aged between 26 and 40, had a university degree or above and worked in either a government department or academia.
Update: Foreign Expert has a nice little roundup of Single's Day-related content on Chinese-language sites.
Links and Sources
Qianlong: 愁在心头口难开 28当嫁30当婚七成单身想结婚
The Beijing News: 大龄白领相亲 凭“三证”入场
Netease: I'm Single, I'm Happy image
Baidu: How are we going to spend Single's Day image
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