Mama mia!

Middle-aged Chinese women find a new obsession in teenage pop stars

Dama (大妈), middle-aged Chinese women known for their bulk buying of gold and ubiquitous love of square dancing, have a new obsession: pop stars, particularly male singers young enough to be their sons.

While waiting with flowers and cakes for their idols at airports and chasing them down with cameras like paparazzi, these women - nicknamed "mama fans" (妈妈粉 māma fěn) - can be even more adventurous than teenage groupies.

The way they show their love is different to teeny-boppers. Young people tend to picture these stars as their boyfriend or girlfriend, but mama fans see themselves as proxy mothers to these starlets.

Often, the younger a pop star is, the more likely he or she will attract a large number of mama fans. In a marketing sense, this is no bad thing: these women have money and can afford to buy albums and concert tickets. They also make excellent promoters, and with the confidence of age can scream and holler at live shows loud enough to put younger counterparts to shame.

On the 15th birthday of Jackson Yi (易烊千玺), a member of TFboys, one of the most popular boy bands in China, a mama fan in the United States rented a plane to fly over Seattle, New York City and Los Angeles pulling a banner that wished him a happy birthday.

Another mama fan in the southern Chinese city of Xiamen rented a LED board near the ferry wharf to display a similar message, while others brought advertising space on buses, at subway stations and in crowded places in major cities.

Moms for Jackson, a fan club in China, even launched a campaign to raise funds to open a school named after the signer for children from low-income families.

The spending power of dama has already turned the world's gold market on its ear, and they have put up an almost militant defense of synchronized dancing in public squares, yet their obsession with pop idols is arguably their most outlandish obsession yet.

Su Yun, a middle school teacher in Changsha, capital of Hunan province, is a secret fan of the TFboys.

"I couldn't understand why my students and my daughter like these three boys so much, especially my 11-year-old daughter, who used all her free time on her iPad reading news on TFboys," says the 35-year-old.

She adds that she was also shocked at how dedicated their fans could be. In June, Karry Wang (王俊凯), another member of the band, made social media history when his birthday message was reposted more than 42 million times on Sina Weibo, the Twitter-like platform. It earned him a place in the Guinness World Records.

However, one day, curiosity got the better of Su and she sat with her daughter to watch a performance and an interview with the band. To her surprise, she found the boys' tones and language reminded her of the best students in her class - only they were cuter.

"I realized there are many great attributes about these boys," she recalls. "They're open-minded, optimistic and humble, and I was relieved by the thought that they're a good influence on my daughter and my students."

She soon found herself devoting more and more time to the band. At first she viewed it as a chance to share time and an interest with her daughter. Then, gradually, she started to like the band herself.

"While listening to their songs I relaxed and got to relive some of my teenage dreams, and my heart gradually softened," she says.

Yet as a respectable teacher, Su was not sure whether she should go to fan meetings with her daughter. Then she got to know Dai Haixia, a housewife with two children and a big fan of TFboys, who told her of her experience traveling from Beijing to Chongqing to visit the boy band for a documentary on Youku, the video-streaming website.

In the video, her in-laws did not approve of her "childish" decision, but she insisted, saying that her life as a full-time housewife was rejuvenated after she became a fan and found time for her own interests. Knowing there were others like her meant Su felt better about her obsession.

EXO-M, a Chinese-South Korean boy band, has also attracted many middle-aged mama fans. Former members Lu Han (鹿晗), Kris Wu (吴亦凡) and Lay Zhang (张艺兴), now in their 20s, all have their own mama fan clubs. They're young, good-looking, and are sold as teenage idols who can dance, sing and act.

Being a member of those fan clubs means mothers have to "work together" with younger fans: the teenagers take care of online activities, like getting the latest single to the top of the charts, while mama fans take care of offline activities like organizing meetings or thinking about promotions and philanthropic projects.

"I like him not only because he's talented, but also he beats South Korean pop stars in many ways. It should make Chinese proud," says a 40-year-old mama fan who organized a fan meeting to talk about Kris Wu of EXO-M.

Courtesy of The World of Chinese, www.theworldofchinese.com

The World of Chinese

(China Daily European Weekly 04/29/2016 page23)