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More than 3 lakh couples cash in on ‘Olympics wedding’

— PHOTO: Xinhua

Newly-wed couples hold a special wedding ceremony to promote environment-friendly and economical weddings in Huaian, Jiangsu Province, on the opening day of the Beijing Olympic Games.

BEIJING: Here’s one Olympics competition where China definitely set a record: at least 3,14,224 couples tied the knot across the nation on August 8 (or 08/08/08), the opening day of the 29th Olympic Games, showed official statistics.

As expected, that was a one-day record for marriages since 1949, when the People’s Republic of China was founded, said the Ministry of Civil Affairs. Although there’s no previous national figure available, so many cities set records that the country-wide tally is considered to be the record. In Beijing alone, the host city of the Olympics, 15,646 couples were married, 23 times the daily average.

The previous one-day record for marriages in the capital was 4,452 on December 18, 2006, which had one eight in it by the western calendar. Under the lunar calendar, it was October 28, which had two eights.

On August 8 last year, 3,390 couples were married in Beijing, making it the second most popular date after December 18.

Major Chinese cities saw a surge of applications to wed on Friday, either for the triple-eight symbolism or to catch an “Olympic wedding.”

The number eight symbolises wealth, fortune and luck for Chinese.

Many choose dates with the number to start a business, marry, deliver babies or undertake some other significant step. People also pay extra to have it in phone numbers or vehicle license plates.

Local civil affairs authorities said that 6,418 couples were married in Shanghai on Friday and 4,841 in Wuhan. Figures for other cities were not immediately available.

The Ministry held a special meeting last week asking local authorities to increase staff, use volunteers, work longer hours and open more offices to cope with the surge.

Some registration offices in Beijing and Tianjin worked around the clock to meet demand. The Chaoyang District office in eastern Beijing registered a couple shortly after it opened for business at midnight. — Xinhua

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