Catch Me a Catch--Singles Reach for a Match

In late September, the Executive Yuan's Central Personnel Administration (CPA) organized a trip for singles to central Taiwan. In addition to employees from the Executive Yuan, the event also attracted many participants from China Development Industrial Bank, Formosa Plastics, Cathay Life, United Silicon, Applied Materials Taiwan, and other firms. In addition, the Taipei City Bureau of Civil Affairs held a singles event last year and is planning another one (a trip to the Lin An-tai Ancestral Home) at the coming Mid-Autumn Festival, thus helping to bring about meetings between female government employees and men working at Nankang Economic and Trade Park and Neihu Light Industrial Park. With the Executive Yuan's Central Personnel Administration jumping into the business of matchmaking, and the Taipei City Bureau of Civil Affairs already approaching its second foray into the field, it seems clear that men and women in modern society don't have enough chances to meet in a wholesome atmosphere. A distressing number of people who want to get married aren't having any luck.

According to statistics released by the Ministry of the Interior's Population Administration, there were 2,800,736 single persons aged 25 or above in Taiwan in 2000. Informal estimates put the number of matchmaking services (using the term rather loosely) in Taiwan at more than 1000, generally classed into the following two types:

One type introduces entire groups of men and women to each other and lets the individuals take it from there. A number of TV shows fall in this category, including "Channel Love," "Spark 50," and "Love Flies in from Afar." Also in this category are the China Youth Corps, the YWCA, Citymatch, the National Taiwan University Alumni Association, and the Sugar in Your Coffee Club (run by the Creation Social Welfare Foundation).

The other type includes groups like "Super Matchmaker-Mama Jan," which introduce people one-on-one, much as traditional matchmakers have always done. Former legislator Li Sheng-feng runs a rather well known service, and the Unification Church is also very active. There are many types of organization involved, each with an approach that appeals to a different market segment.

Japan's "idol dramas"

Some of the hottest matchmaking firms in the market focus on organizing singles activities for highly educated men and women between the ages of 26 and 35. The activities, always trendy and tasteful, usually take place twice a month. One of these is large in scale, while the other is a smaller get-together for tea or the like. In addition, an "e-club" is used to inform members of coming activities, and the company has a website where it publishes an e-newsletter in which members can learn how other members think about relations between the sexes, money management, trendy new consumer items, cooking, astrology, and more. After individual members zero in on someone they're interested in, the company organizes a large group activity, typically held at a large hotel.

A Mr. Lin, who often takes part in this type of event, likens the atmosphere to a Japanese "idol drama," in the sense that such get-togethers are designed to provide a charge of romance for highly educated men and women. Says Mr. Lin: "You go there and imagine yourself to be one of the beautiful people, just like on TV. It makes you feel special, so there's naturally a market for that type of thing!"

Other organizations attract people by providing practical courses. Citymatch, for example, this past summer offered people aged 40 to 58 a number of activities besides large get-togethers, including makeup classes and Latin aerobics. The idea is apparently to enhance people's chances by improving their outward appearance.

These approaches are clearly the most popular today. Also very popular are online dating services, where visitors fill out questionnaires that will hopefully guide them to that special someone.

Here are some of the questions one is asked to respond to: "Many people now live together before deciding whether to marry. How do you feel about this?" "What do you like to eat?" "What color(s) do you avoid wearing?" "What kind of books and movies do you like?" "What are your long-term plans?" "Would you be willing to live with your parents after marriage?" "Do you want to stay home and take care of the family, or do you want to work?" This approach is a very quick and direct way of finding someone who meets one's requirements, but it is rather unromantic, and the results-oriented, transaction-like feel of it elicits very different reactions from men and women.

Some other once-popular methods of finding a mate are now slipping out of the mainstream, such as the traditional one-on-one meetings put together by a matchmaker, and slow-paced TV shows like "I Love the Matchmaker," where participants interview prospective mates behind a drawn curtain.

Chatting with the enemy

Liu Yung-fu, a veteran organizer of group mixers who has worked as a matchmaker at China Youth Corps (CYC) for over ten years, has some sound advice for anyone seeking a mate: "Guys generally start wanting to try out somebody new after they've been with one woman for a while, so women have to be ready with countermeasures of their own. Men are more animal in nature. Put a tasty hamburger in front of them and they'll lunge in with big bites. They tend to be hungry for success. They think in terms of return on investment, and they like to have a lot of telephone numbers in their list of contacts. Women, on the other hand, put more stress on spiritual and emotional growth. They like to cultivate an interest in literature and the arts, and once they commit to a relationship they like to keep it going on a long-term basis."

CYC is certainly the granddaddy of all the organizations offering large group activities. It is well-known and trusted, its fees are low, and it is very careful to ensure security. As a result, CYC is one of the most popular matchmaking groups around. CYC offers both entertaining activities and "personal growth encounters," and this combination brings the difference between men and women into sharp focus. "Guys just like to keep a lot of different irons in the fire, but women come to us because they believe in love," says Liu, who explains that at a typical CYC group activity, the guys get up and change tables once every hour while the women sit tight and wait for the action to come to them. It might appear that the women are in the weaker position, but as often as not it is women who get the most out of such occasions.

Mr. Lin, who holds a PhD in engineering from National Chiao Tung University, opines: "When a guy or girl sees an attractive stranger on the street, it is perfectly natural for them to want to tell the other person how they feel, but Taiwanese culture doesn't encourage people to chat up strangers. A guy who does that is considered a sex fiend, and if a girl did it she'd be regarded as loose. In France, on the other hand, the girls feel that if a guy sees a good-looking girl, it's only polite of him to get up the courage to start a conversation. Male-female relations in Taiwan are miserable. If we could allow ourselves to be romantic like the French, singles activities in Taiwan would be a lot more meaningful."

A Ms. Wu, who enjoys reading books on psychology and has taken part in various boy-meets-girl functions, does not agree. She feels that using such occasions as an opportunity for men to learn how to strike up conversations with strangers would only put women in a tough spot: "After all, the romanticism of the French has evolved slowly over a long period of time. Rather than encourage our guys to use group mixers to learn how to chat up strangers, it would be more constructive for them to learn more about the emotional needs of women."

Certain pointers, however, apply to both genders. Liu Yung-fu advises both men and women that wearing neat, clean clothes is the absolute least one should do from the standpoint of politeness. He also says that a sincere desire to be considerate and an ability to focus on the other person will do more than anything else to win over a person's heart. It goes over really well when a guy puts on a touch of lightly scented cologne, for example, or a girl wears a midriff top or a sleeveless dress with a closely tailored jacket.

Tall in the saddle

Taking part in singles activities is only the first step. The game has only just begun at that point. Laughingly describing CYC as a "one-stop service," Liu Yung-fu reminds young hopefuls that it is all too difficult to find a suitable partner, and no one should ever think that they've "got it made" in their love life. One can become complacent, stop trying, and through sheer laziness lose everything that has been gained.

Noting the popularity on the singles scene of young professionals working at the high-tech industrial park in Hsinchu, over an hour's drive southwest of Taipei, Liu laments that many of these people may be star performers on the job, but they're clueless about how to treat women. After a few dates, these guys have been known to start asking the girls to come down to Hsinchu to see them. The girls get tired of all the running around, and budding romances wither on the vine. Says Liu: "After people meet at our get-togethers, we often get involved in counseling them. We listen to complaints from both sides, and we frequently have to give guidance to knuckleheaded young men. We have to teach them how to take the initiative, and how to tell little white lies."

When people meet someone through a big singles activity, they generally care quite a bit in the early stages about what their good friends think of the new acquaintance, which is why CYC often follows up on a big gathering by organizing a smaller one for people who seem to have hit it off well. The atmosphere at these smaller occasions is a lot of fun, kind of like a group of friends getting together, and the CYC people do their part to help things progress. The success rate is quite good. In more than a decade at CYC, Liu has helped bring about over 200 marriages, and nearly every couple has followed the same pattern, meeting at a large event and progressing to a smaller group before making a firm connection. In fact, that is precisely how Liu himself wound up getting married three years ago.

There are many others who have participated in singles activities a number of times and come away frustrated. According to Ms. Liu Yi-chen, general secretary of Citymatch and a matchmaker for more than a decade, the most common problem is where people go in with unrealistic expectations, such as a dentist in his 40s who insisted on getting a pretty young girl in her 20s, and got mad when anyone tried to steer him toward anyone not matching his specs. "Marriage should be a match between equals. There aren't many people who would have filled the bill for that man," says Ms. Liu, adding that most participants are self-serving. They think only of their own best interests, and this attitude is frequently what causes them to miss the opportunity to find an appropriate mate. When people don't find success, argues Ms. Liu, the fundamental problem is most often to be found within themselves.

Is love dead?

Of course, anyone taking part in such activities naturally goes in with certain hopes, but setting one's sights too high is not a recipe for success, and worst of all, failure to find a mate through such channels can lead to frustration and despair. This is especially true of women, who tend not to take the initiative in courtship.

A certain Ms. Fang has taken part in numerous singles activities without success. Employed at a clothing boutique, the full-figured Ms. Fang bitterly confides that experience has shown her that most men who take part in such activities go in and scan the girls with the superficial eye of a male chauvinist. Seeing the men cull the prospects with a proud relish has been a disgusting sight for Ms. Fang, who always dreamed of falling passionately in love with someone. "I had hoped to find a beautiful relationship through the singles activities, but I gave up all hope after seeing those men sizing us up with nothing more than a quick glance at our figures and faces. Why don't they take a look at themselves in the mirror?"

A Mr. Tsou, who jokes about himself being a grizzled veteran of these singles activities, takes a different view. He feels that a girl had better be psychologically prepared for a trying experience, and a fat girl can't blame the men for not feeling attracted. It's up to the girls themselves to make an effort to lose weight. "Keeping in good shape and dressing nicely is all part of showing consideration for what others think."

Tsou urges women not to be unfairly judgmental of men, because men do not necessarily look at women as objects. "I've met several overweight girls at these activities who were very outgoing and sensitive to other people's feelings. Those girls were very popular with the guys. Rather than complaining, girls should take active steps to enhance the impression they make on people at these singles activities."

Is it really so hard for men and women to find true love at singles activities? How should girls prepare psychologically for participation in such events? And how should they view men's emotional needs?

A shy man named Hsu, who works in an administrative job at Cathay General Hospital, is a former participant in singles activities who now volunteers at Citymatch. Mr. Hsu relates that after volunteering for a while he discovered that the women at singles activities are actually much more lively participants than the men. Women very often speak their mind and say who they like, and Hsu frequently sees women participants make friends among themselves. And while everyone says that men control the initiative in courtship and are "quick to change channels," Hsu finds that many guys go around writing down phone numbers left and right, then lack the courage after going home to make a single call. "Some men have been coming to these things for over a decade and they still haven't found anybody."

A Mr. Lien refuses to take part in singles activities because he feels that a mature relationship between a man and woman should be based on love. "It ought to be possible in theory for people to find true love through singles activities, but it doesn't happen, mainly because men and women don't deal with each other on a spiritual level."

Although Mr. Lien holds a masters' degree in engineering from a prestigious university, this idealistic young man with a bent for keeping his own counsel is currently unemployed. "I'm in no position to take part in singles activities. A guy's got to have a certain minimum socio-economic status, so I'm perfectly aware that there's no reason for me to go and get my nose bloodied. Singles activities are actually nothing more than traditional matchmaker-arranged meetings carried out on a large scale. The idea is to get as many people as possible married as efficiently as possible. The spark of true love is naturally not going to be too strong in a situation like that."

Bringing out each other's best

When singles activities do not lead to a beautiful love story, people naturally begin to have serious doubts about the quality of relations between the sexes. CYC's Liu Yung-fu states candidly that society's values have been changing rapidly, and a new style of male-female relations has yet to take root. Many Taiwanese girls now insist that suitors have both money and status. Others have simply pinned their hopes blindly on looking for Prince Charming in a foreigner. Men, for their part, want a woman to be perfect in every way, as if she were a luxury automobile. Says Liu: "A successful relationship between a man and woman doesn't just happen. It's based on a system of values. If your heart is in the wrong place, and you only take part in singles activities in order to shop around and get 'the best deal for yourself' and raise a brood of superkids, or if you go and get married in a fever, you're just wasting your time and everyone else's. You should choose a mate on the basis of personality and character."

In Liu's opinion, there is more than one way to have a happy experience with singles activities. One might, for example, approach it with the idea of seeking out other like-minded people, and go on from singles activities to become good friends and get involved in community service, with each person bringing out the best in the other. Such a relationship would have to be considered a success even if it didn't lead to marriage.

Although she has been making matches for over ten years and now heads Citymatch, Liu Yi-chen remains single, but she still cherishes dreams of a happy marriage, and hopes to meet the right person before too long. In any case, she strongly feels that her time spent caring for others at Citymatch has been worth it, for her efforts have not gone unappreciated.

Sometimes the spark of love has to be fanned into flames by a helpful third party. Could it be that Cupid has his golden arrow trained on you right now?

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Participants at a matchmaking mixer switch from table to table while playing games to break the ice.

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This happy couple met at a matchmaking event.

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She may seem shy and retiring now, but will she turn into Godzilla after the wedding? It takes a lot of effort to maintain a successful marriage. (graphic by Lee Su-ling)

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The outgoing and humorous Liu Yung-fu (left) has helped bring about more than 200 marriages in over ten years as "head matchmaker" at the China Youth Corps.

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Ambience is important at matchmaking get-togethers. The great outdoors is a good place for people to open up and get to know each other.