Get married in Shanghai before October 1!

We already briefly mentioned our surprise Shanghai wedding and linked to some of the cheesy memorable photos from the ceremony. If you want similar keepsakes, you need to get married in Shanghai before October 1 -- the city is discontinuing the photo service. There is nothing stopping you from having a friend tag along with a camera, however.

The move is meant to get the government department out of profit-making sideline businesses, officials said.

The new rules were issued by the Shanghai Civil Affairs Bureau on August 22, according to Zhou Jixiang, director of the Shanghai Marriage Management Division.

"The government serves the public and should not try to gain extra profit," said Zhou. "We charge 10 yuan (US$1.25) for marriage certificates, 9 yuan to get divorced, and that will be it."

We're pretty sure we paid 9 kuai for our marriage certificates. (Unless ... maybe it was a surprise divorce?!? That sure would suck.) Another discrepancy in the story:

Couples registering to marry or divorce must now supply their own 2cm by 2cm headshots.

Our head shot was a two-person head shot and 5 cm by 4 cm. 2 cm by 2 cm seems a bit small, unless they are talking about the size of the heads in the double shot. Anyway, kind of a pain that they won't even take those photos for you. But, take our word, visit the Shanghai Marriage Service Center -- it's the best 9 kuai we've ever spent.