Cross-national couples in China divorce due to cultural differences. (Photo : Getty Images)
Cross-national couples add to the growing divorce rate in China as couples with different cultural backgrounds and parenting styles fail to consolidate their differences.
A report from the Global Times revealed how cross-national couples contribute a huge chunk of the country's total divorce statistics since marriage between Chinese and foreigners became a trend.
During the early years of their marriage, most of the couples thought that they have found their "soulmate" or "the one." Elaine Chen who was married to a Chilean three years ago was no different.
Three years ago, the 33-year-old Chinese woman was thrilled to have met her ex-husband who was a Chilean national in Beijing. The two hit it off almost immediately and decided to get married a month from their first meeting.
"He is handsome and he has lived in Japan for several years. Since I studied Japanese language and cultural for many years, we had a lot to talk about. Besides, he and I share the same eagerness to start a family, so we decided to take a leap of faith," Chen told the Global Times.
But what Chen and her husband did not foresee was the difficulties of having a concrete relationship to serve as a foundation for the marriage. After four short months, the couple divorced.
Chen believes that the issue was that they lacked understanding about each other's background which caused a lot of tension in the family.
"I guess the tragic result was mainly due to lack of understanding each other's past and character before we were married; the different cultural backgrounds caused tension and communication issues and we fought a lot because of that," she explained.
In previous reports, Chinese bachelors are having difficulties in finding wives as consequences of the sudden retraction of the one-child policy and gender preference is felt across the nation.
