It's his wedding ... and he'll cry if he wants to

Shanghaiist used to have this pink dream (fenhongse de meng or 粉红色的梦) about weddings. They should be happy, joyful, unbelievably romantic days with lots of kisses and flowers. (Hey, a girl can dream!) But now to harsh reality: This wedding in Kunming (news in Chinese) two weeks ago is one of the worst we could imagine.

The bride, A Rong, kept the groom, Huang Tianrong, waiting and waiting and waiting, but never showed up. Mr. Huang told the reporter he started this relationship with A Rong three years ago, and everything was alright until he presented the betrothal gifts. His parents-in-law had been complaining the gifts were not enough and they wanted to cancel the wedding. Well, it looks like they meant what they said. The wedding ended up with the groom crying in a private room and all guests were left in the dark.

Betrothal gifts are an age-old tradition of brides-to-be taking gifts from the groom-to-be to her family, similar to arranged marriages. We had thought China’s dating scene had modernized but what do we know -- we grew up in Shanghai. Seems old habits are hard to break (but weddings are very easy to break-off).

On a side note, Huang should feel better when he reads this -- at least nobody got physically hurt. Maybe he'll have better luck with the next girl?