People's Park Marriage Market

The People’s Park marriage market (人民公园相亲角, Rénmín Gōngyuán Xiāngqīn Jiǎo) is a weekend gathering where parents look for partners for their unmarried adult children. No one runs it. Parents put up notices describing their sons and daughters, then read the notices of other families.

The park is at 231 Nanjing West Road, Huangpu District. It was created in 1952 from the northern half of the former Shanghai racecourse; the Shanghai Race Club that ran the course had been established in 1862. The southern half of the site became People’s Square.

English Wikipedia dates the market to 2004. The Chinese Wikipedia article describes a slower start in the early 21st century: older people who exercised in the park began to swap information about unmarried children, and the habit grew into a gathering that drew families from across the city.

Sources give the schedule as Saturday and Sunday, noon to 5 p.m. A 2011 report on the US public-radio programme Marketplace described a Saturday scene. There is no official timetable, so the hours are best treated as a rough guide.

What you see is paper. Notices hang on strings, are clipped to trees, are attached to bags and umbrellas, or lie on the ground. The 2011 report described fliers and resumes covering trees, benches, walls and walkways. Each notice lists the child’s age, height, job, income, education and zodiac sign, among other details.

The notices are not scattered at random. Wikipedia describes sub-zones for particular groups, including birth year, divorcees and region, and the Marketplace reporter noted that parents could search by birth year, height and location. The reporter found that most of the people there were mothers.