By CCTV.com Panview editor team     

Editor’s foreword: "Looking China" International Youth Film Project is co-organized by the Academy for International Communication of Chinese Culture (AICCC), Beijing Normal University and Huilin Foundation, which aims to showcase the contrasting simplicity and glamour, the antiquity and fashion of China through unique perspectives of young foreign film makers.

The film, Age, Height, Education, directed by Kate Lefoe, takes viewers to Shanghai People’s Park, where parents seeking brides or grooms for their children, post papers with biographical details of their offspring.

Although, the Chinese are not known for being tall, parents seem to have a height fetish, detailing the exact height of their children as one of the top characteristics.

Shanghai is the financial capital of China and many families have earned substantial wealth. They require their children to get a good education, graduate from top Chinese universities to ensure they get stable jobs or big salaries at the office.

According to Chinese custom, the groom of the family is expected to provide a new home for the newly-wedded and pay for an expensive wedding. To do otherwise would mean the marriage is doomed from their perspective. Hence, the search for soul mates is a big business here.

Parents carefully study the bios of perspective spouses and do some deal-making with marriage match-makers. But upon closer inspection of Shanghai People’s Park, you will soon notice only the parents are in attendance.

Parents interviewed mention their children are so busy in their work that they do not have time to engage in the marriage hunt, despite their lives being most-affected by it.

With pressure amounting along the fast pace of life and work in metropolitan cities such as Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou, young generations do not seem eager nor find it easy to step into a marriage, while their more traditional parents are pressing hard, especially during family reunion times of the Spring Festival.

( The opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Panview or CCTV.com. )

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