By Xia Yubing xiayubing@globaltimes.com.cn

Vietnamese groom and bride ready to ride in Hoa Lu, Ninh Binh Province. Photos: AFP

Mandopop culture stereotypes the Vietnamese women as a sexy and gentle Maggie Q, actress Christy Chung or the women in the Mekong River-based romantic story L'Amant by Marguerite Duras.

Offscreen, marrying a Vietnamese virgin for bargain prices is a rising and popular trend in rural China and when it comes to the real deal, some Chinese men are getting burnt by beautiful swindlers into cheap-and-chic marriages.

As Wuhan-based Chutian Metropolis Daily reported, nine Chinese men in the Dabie Mountains of Hubei Province "lost" their wives in early October. The brides to which they had been introduced in August and September escaped together with goods and property worth 180,000 yuan ($26,352): an organized crime, police concluded.

Although the con stories are everyday news and the scams well discussed on the Internet, the popularity of Asian matchmaking agencies, their websites and their virgin brides continues undiminished.

The situation in Taiwan used to be much more severe, according to a scholar who has studied immigration issues and specializes in Asian bride-trafficking.

"The purchase of Vietnamese brides already had formed a market," Han Jialing, a professor at the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences told the Global Times. "Women have been sold to Taiwan, South Korea and other places for decades recently."

Chinese mainland men are also known throughout Asia for growing richer, resulting in multinational matchmaking agencies that target new wealth.

"Now the problem in Taiwan is getting better," Han said. "At least the advertising is not as undisguised as it used to be.

"We cannot just sit back and watch things deteriorate in the Chinese mainland."

Selling points

Two girls talk in a park in Hanoi, Vietnam. Photo: AFP

Multinational matchmaking agencies promote their Vietnamese product line through traditional time-honored selling points: youth, virginity, beauty and homemaking.

All candidates for sale are 18-25 years old, according to the promotional brochure of the "ASEAN Vietnamese Bride Network". As the legal marriage age for women is 20 in China, the Network has a 15-45 day, $5,500 plan B for marrying an 18-20 year-old Vietnamese.

The would-be groom goes to Vietnam and marries there. He cannot bring his wife back until the newlyweds pass an interview at the immigration office of Vietnam and obtain all the necessary certificates and documents.

The paperwork to marry a 20-25-year-old Vietnamese takes five to 15 days and then the wedding can be held in China. Both single and divorced men must provide the rel-evant official Chinese evidence that they are not married.

The ASEAN Vietnamese Bride Network promises all the young women they supply are "slim and beautiful", even claiming "there is no lack of mixed blood and smooth white complexion" catering to the exotic and traditional beauty mores of Asian culture.

Online shopping for Vietnamese brides is little different from old stories in which men in developed eastern China cities bought wives from western rural regions, according to Shen Yifei, the deputy secretary-general of the Gender and Development Research Center at Fudan University in Shanghai.

Men in need have always bought wives from impoverished areas, Shen told the Global Times. "The business has just developed from domestic sales to international trade," she said.

Photographer Ma Hongjie in 2000 documented the story of a disabled man buying a wife from the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region in northwestern China. His Buying a Wife in the West photo series proved influential.

Buying Vietnamese brides usually occurs on the Chinese borders. "The buyers are 30-40 years-old, poor and marginal men," Han told the Global Times.

First of all, she said, those who buy wives cannot afford to marry a local Chinese wife. Second, as more and more rural women went to the cities, it is getting even harder for men who stay in the village to find a wife.

Virgins

As an anthropologist, Han has studied firsthand the ageless popularity and stunning stupidity of racial stereotypes both abroad and on the Chinese mainland.

"Highlighting the feminine beauty of Vietnamese women is in substance the same thing as promoting the identical personality of Chinese women to Western men," she said. "They are just the same kind of propaganda."

All the Vietnamese women are guaranteed virgins, boasts the ASEAN Vietnamese Bride Network. "Female virtues" such as "traditional lifestyle" and "marriage fidelity" are marketed as attractive attributes of these prospective perfect wives.

"The virgin complex has always existed in Chinese society," Shen said. "The value of virgins is particularly reflected in commercial sex."

The virgin request is a strong indicator of traditional values, Han said, where women should be chaste and servile.

"Virginity, tenderness, good housekeeper – these are all selling points," Han said. "Wherever the purchase takes place, treating women like commodities and then tagging them with such favorable labels in order to get a higher price – what's the difference between this and a slave-trade society?"

International media reports on the buying and selling of brides harms China's image and reputation as a world power, she said.

The family homemaker function is also a successful selling point. Her enthusiasm and competence for looking after a family are portrayed as the bedrock of successful Sino-Vietnam matrimonial ties.

"Buying a wife, in itself, is buying the function of sex, and the function of reproductivity. The wife role here does not mean a soul mate at all," Shen said.

"The woman's value is no more than a sex object and the mother of their offspring."

Matchmaking agencies also offer Chinese language courses to Vietnamese brides. The lack of a common language indicates just how low a poor Chinese man is willing to go to find a spouse, Shen told the Global Times.

"Even though communication between some Chinese couples is too simple or too shallow, at least they can communicate.

"But finding a non- Chinese speaking wife more or less suggests that these poor men have already given up hope. Their only purpose is to solve sex and reproduction problems."

Vietnamese brides have become a brand like Filipino maids, Han told the Global Times, something "to which multinational matchmaking agencies have contributed a lot."

The Chinese mainland's planned birth policies have unbalanced the gender ratio, leaving millions of excess Chinese men wifeless.

"This is not only a gender problem, but also a poverty one," Shen told the Global Times. "The gap between the rich and the poor created the difficulty of getting married for men in rural areas."

Traditional stereotypes

A Vietnamese bride poses with her Taiwanese husband in Ho Chi Minh City. Photo: AFP

Han characterized the issue as more ideological.

"Chinese traditional thinking pushed poor, single men in remote, impoverished regions to find a woman to carry on the family line."

Getting married is not their problem alone: the government is also responsible, Han said. "County authorities should make more opportunities for them to date, more chances to build a family."

Susan Greenhalgh, professor of anthropology at University of California, Irvine, is cooperating with the School of Social Development and Public Policy in Fudan University to research the issue. As author of Just One Child: Science and Policy in Deng's China, Greenhalgh has for decades specialized in gender, population, and demography issues.

"Who is buying? What are the determining factors of the price? How do gender-stereotyped images hurt both women and men respectively? How do we protect the weak? We've got so many questions," Shen said.

"It's easy for researchers to identify the problems, but it is very hard to solve them. That's why I am participating in the research project."

The three main marital problems that resulted from these imported brides were communication between husband and wife, child rearing and protection of immigrants' rights, Han told the Global Times.

"Undocumented marriage and immigrants need more government attention," she said.

Meanwhile online, Vietnamese brides are being labeled "whores", "bitches", "sluts" and "barefaced gold diggers".

"They are case by case and we must not over-generalize," Han said.

The Vietnamese women are victims, too, Shen argued.

"In many cases, the betrothal gifts belong to the bride's family and the matchmaking agency," Shen said. "The woman in the deal barely benefits from her own marriage, regardless of whether her buyer is generous or not."

Matchmaking agencies value the weakness of these women: poor family, familiar with hardship, tolerant, experienced at pleasing others and so on. This advertising makes some men feel compassionate and desire to protect these vulnerable Cinderellas.

Poor women are by no means alone in hoping marriage will change their material lives.

But in reality, not every poor woman can find a rich husband: First, few poor women are pretty enough. Second, few have lives that overlap with rich men, diminishing their chances of ever meeting Mr. Right. Third, those poor women who decide to enter the service industry hoping a rich man will sweep them off their feet are more likely to be cajoled, assaulted and lose their virginity. Aligned with traditional Asian views, most of these women face a daunting disadvantage.

"It is considerably difficult for poor women to be pretty, because of their poverty, which leads to poor dress and makeup," Shen said. "Finding a job in the service industries makes them instantly better-looking, but the loss of virginity is a high price to pay for it."