A good man is hard to find: China's 'leftover women' look for love abroad
Well-educated, Chinese singletons in their late-20s or older - branded 'leftover women' by a chauvinistic society - are looking further afield for husbands who aren't turned off by their age or earning power, writes Isobel Yeung
Loretta Xu Liang unzips her pink Juicy Couture jumper and sinks into her sofa.
"Chinese men are terrified of me, both emotionally and financially," she sighs.
It's 10pm and Xu has just returned from work to her immaculate apartment in a central district of Shanghai. She's one of 12 urban, middle-class women I am interviewing for a documentary on "leftover women" (or " "), and I'm starting to notice a trend.
At 31, Xu is confident and attractive, and earns about 35,000 yuan (HK$43,500) a month, more than eight times the national average. On the face of it, she represents the essence of a modern Chinese woman; better educated and more accomplished than ever before. But like most single women her age, she's under intense pressure to tie the knot, both from her family and from state media.
Parents take it upon themselves to act as matchmakers in the marriage markets and large-scale speed-dating events that are popping up across almost every Chinese city. The newspaper recently published a survey that suggests 89 per cent of young singletons are forced to go on dates during the Lunar New Year holiday, 61 per cent of whom are aged between 25 and 30 years old.
Countless surveys, articles, cartoons and television shows depict excessively fussy women who selfishly turn up their noses at potential suitors. Headlines such as "Nine Bad Habits that Keep Leftover Women from Good Men" and "Eight Categories of Leftover Women, One Glance and Men Will Run Away" continue to pepper reports.
