After two Chinese New Year holidays working as a rental girlfriend, and another two of confinement at home due to the pandemic closures, Shui has finally been able to spend these holidays with her family. She left her job last fall and now, at 26, is trying to make her way as a streamer selling skincare products on an e-commerce platform.
In 2020 we met her in Tianjin, northern China. She was quite nervous because she was going to spend an entire week with a client who paid her 1,176 euros a day to accompany him to his hometown during the New Year. The young woman emphasizes that she only rented out her time, never her body.
“He was a gay businessman with a very traditional family. His parents kept pressuring him to get married and have children. Since he was afraid to tell them the truth, he hired me to pretend to be his partner. Last year, when the pandemic restrictions eased, I returned to continue with the charade,” Shui reveals.
A few months ago, a heated debate erupted on Chinese social media about the intense societal pressure young people face to get married, sparked by an investigative report published by a Chinese journalist who posed as a customer on a rental bride website. That’s where he met Mumu, an administrator who earned an additional salary for a daily rate of 170 euros.
She shared that some of her clients, mostly individuals over thirty, even paid her to play the role of a bride at a fake wedding, complete with a banquet. Others were single individuals from rural areas who hired her during national holidays for company.
“During Chinese New Year, there are always 1,000 new users who need a girlfriend to introduce to their parents,” said Cao Tiantian, founder of Hire Me Plz, in an interview. Hire Me Plz is one of several applications in the country where men and women offer themselves as rental partners.
The most recent census conducted in 2021 revealed that there were 220 million single people living in China, which accounts for 13.3% of the population. The census also highlighted that the country had nearly 35 million more single men than women, with the majority falling between the ages of 20 and 40.
Qingdao, located on China’s east coast, is known for its beer festival and German colonial heritage. Recently, it made headlines as local authorities created a dating app to match singles in the area.
In Shandong province, where Qingdao is situated, the Communist Party’s youth have organized group dating parties to match singles in many towns. This initiative aims to counter the prevailing conservative mindset and encourage young people to marry, have children, and address the current demographic crisis.
While Valentine’s Day is celebrated in many parts of the world on February 14th, in China, it is known as the Qixi Festival and is typically observed in the seventh month of the lunar calendar, which usually falls in August. On the last Valentine’s Day, the government of a city in Sichuan province planned to broadcast live wedding ceremonies, assuming many couples would wed on this day. However, to their surprise, not a single couple appeared at the registry to get married.