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发帖数: 8087 | 1 In China, Money Can Often Buy Love
By DIDI KIRSTEN TATLOW
Published: November 11, 2010
BEIJING — Money really can buy you love in China — or at least that seems
to be a common belief in this
increasingly materialistic country.
Many personal stories seem to confirm that the ideal mate is the one who can
deliver a home and a car,
among other things; sentiment is secondary.
However widespread this mercantilist spirit, not everyone thinks it is a
good thing. A spate of Chinese films,
plays and television shows have raised the question: What is love in an age
of breakneck economic growth?
Many Chinese were shocked this year when a female contestant on a popular TV
dating show, “If You Are
the One,” announced: “I’d rather cry in a BMW than smile on a bicycle.”
But others insisted that the
contestant, Ma Nuo, now popularly known as “the BMW woman,” was merely
expressing a social reality.
Rocketing property prices in recent years have contributed to such feelings,
with many people in Beijing and
other cities accepting the idea that a woman will pursue a relationship with
a man only if he already owns
an apartment.
Feng Yuan, a 26-year-old who works in a government education company, tried
to set up a friend with a
man she thought suitable.
“When she heard he didn’t own an apartment, she refused even to meet him,
” recalled Ms. Feng. “She said,
‘What’s the point? Without an apartment, love isn’t possible.”’
Fueling these attitudes is a drumbeat of fear. After three decades of fast-
paced, uneven economic growth,
there is enormous anxiety among those who feel they are being left behind,
lacking the opportunities and
contacts to make big money while all around them others prosper and prices
soar.
The new creed can be hard, as a 26-year-old cultural events organizer
learned.
The man, who asked for anonymity to protect his privacy, earns about 4,000
renminbi, or $600, a month,
making even a modest apartment in an unfashionable district of Beijing
unaffordable. These homes can cost
about $3,000 per square meter, or about $280 per square foot. Housing
inflation is severe. Ten years ago,
a similar apartment cost about $345 per square meter.
Instead, he tried to impress his girlfriend of three years by saving for a
year to buy an iPhone 3. The newer
iPhone 4 — a hot status symbol — had just gone on sale. But at about $900,
that was beyond his means.
The phone was not enough. Last week, she left him, citing pressure from her
parents to find a richer mate.
He is heartbroken, believing, despite all, that his girlfriend truly loved
him. “Why else did she live with me
for three years?” — albeit in a rented apartment. Yet, he is philosophical
, too.
“I understand her situation and the pressure from her family,” he said. “
I also understand that her parents
want their daughter to find someone who can give her a better life.”
The only way to find love, he said, is to become rich. “The most important
thing for me now, is to work and
earn a living.” he said. “I need to grow stronger, support myself and my
parents, and then my future
girlfriend can have a good life.”
Such calculations have their critics. The hard-nosed attitude of Ms. Ma, the
BMW woman, earned her a
gentle reprimand recently from the film director Zhang Yimou. In an
interview in The South China Morning
Post, a Hong Kong newspaper, he urged young people to re-examine their
values.
“I don’t think economic advancement and our yearning for love are mutually
exclusive,” he said.
Mr. Zhang, who turns 59 on Sunday, represents an older generation that
remembers the more egalitarian, if
also poorer and more politically repressive, Maoist era, before the economic
changes that unleashed the
scramble for material advancement.
His latest film, “Under the Hawthorn Tree,” depicts the innocent love
between a teacher, Jing Qiu, and a
geologist, Lao San. Set in 1975 toward the end of the Cultural Revolution,
and without a BMW in sight, the
film shows the teacher spending quite a lot of time smiling on her
sweetheart’s bicycle. Love is the thing, it
concludes.
Other productions have joined the debate.
“Fight the Landlord,” a play by Sun Yue that premiered in Shanghai last
month, is another ringing defense of
love in an age of materialism.
A character known as B, grilled by a potential mother-in-law about her very
ordinary income, yells: “Don’t
think that because I have nothing to be proud of you can insult and destroy
me!”
“I have my dignity and pride,” B says, “and I don’t want to turn love,
which I value so much, into something
vulgar and pale!”
A new film, “Color Me Love,” celebrates the cult of materialism but also
comes down, somewhat, on the side
of love. Modeled on “The Devil Wears Prada,” and with product placement
for Hermès, Versace and Diesel, it
follows poor but gorgeous Fei as she arrives in Beijing to intern at a
fashion magazine.
“Fei, one day you’ll understand,” Zoe, her glamorous editor, cautions her
. “Nothing is as important as the
person you’ll spend the rest of your life with.”
A tumultuous courtship with a wacky artist named Yihong ends up with the
couple united in New York. A
closing shot shows her in his arms, a diamond on her finger. The real
fantasy, perhaps, is love plus money.
Ms. Feng, who had failed to find a match for her apartmentless friend, said
the demands that many Chinese
women make on prospective mates reflected weakness, not power. Lower in
status, they fear not getting
what they want in life, and look to men to provide it.
“Women are very dependent,” she said. “I blame them. Why can’t they work
hard and buy a house together
with their man? But very few women today think like that.”
Few Chinese men do either, reinforcing the rules of the game. For the 26-
year-old events organizer, losing
his love to money was justifiable.
“We didn’t need to waste time on a relationship that was doomed to vanish,
” he said. | s**s
发帖数: 781 | 2 So does in USA
seems
can
【在 a*********g 的大作中提到】
: In China, Money Can Often Buy Love
: By DIDI KIRSTEN TATLOW
: Published: November 11, 2010
: BEIJING — Money really can buy you love in China — or at least that seems
: to be a common belief in this
: increasingly materialistic country.
: Many personal stories seem to confirm that the ideal mate is the one who can
: deliver a home and a car,
: among other things; sentiment is secondary.
: However widespread this mercantilist spirit, not everyone thinks it is a
| d*s
发帖数: 3016 | 3 所有国家都差不多了。
年轻时候，玩玩就好，只要帅就够了。
结婚前提的情况下，有多少人会不考虑经济因素？ | S*******w
发帖数: 24236 | 4 sb啊 在哪买不到
seems
can
【在 a*********g 的大作中提到】
: In China, Money Can Often Buy Love
: By DIDI KIRSTEN TATLOW
: Published: November 11, 2010
: BEIJING — Money really can buy you love in China — or at least that seems
: to be a common belief in this
: increasingly materialistic country.
: Many personal stories seem to confirm that the ideal mate is the one who can
: deliver a home and a car,
: among other things; sentiment is secondary.
: However widespread this mercantilist spirit, not everyone thinks it is a
| s**********w
发帖数: 866 | | t*****k
发帖数: 2547 | 6
【在 s**********w 的大作中提到】
: NYT太厉害了.
: 这是炸药奖级别的重大发现呀!
| p******u
发帖数: 14642 | 7 话说，最近狗蛋厂怎么没新文章了？这么就没见他的中国崩溃论心里都不舒服了 | r****2
发帖数: 470 | | l**k
发帖数: 45267 | 9 把china换成其他国家也成立，nyt激动啥呀
seems
can
【在 a*********g 的大作中提到】
: In China, Money Can Often Buy Love
: By DIDI KIRSTEN TATLOW
: Published: November 11, 2010
: BEIJING — Money really can buy you love in China — or at least that seems
: to be a common belief in this
: increasingly materialistic country.
: Many personal stories seem to confirm that the ideal mate is the one who can
: deliver a home and a car,
: among other things; sentiment is secondary.
: However widespread this mercantilist spirit, not everyone thinks it is a
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