Earthquake can't dampen special wedding

Wei Zhengfeng, a 27-year-old police officer, was married this Sunday in Dujiangyan, a city in Sichuan province badly hit by the May 12 earthquake.

Meanwhile his bride, Sun Jie, who works for an insurance company, was back in their home city of Liu'an, Anhui province.

Wei and Sun had long planned to hold their wedding on June 15. But earlier this month, Wei was sent to Sichuan to support relief efforts.

Before he left, Wei told Sun that he feared he would not be able to return to Liu'an for their wedding.

As the couple and their families had already taken great pains to arrange the wedding banquet, they decided to hold the ceremony without the bridegroom.

"I will call you when the wedding is held so that guests will feel I am present," Wei told his bride-to-be.

While in Sichuan, Wei devoted himself to his work, rebuilding schools in Dujiangyan. He did not talk with colleagues about how he had adjusted his wedding plans.

However, Xie Zhengyi, a police officer who had also traveled to Dujiangyan from Liu'an, knew Wei's unusual circumstance.

Xie decided to help arrange a more meaningful wedding venue - on the grounds of a school, in a tent with the red characters "double happiness" specially painted on the windows.

With the help of the deputy chief of the school, Xie used his laptop computer to help Wei connect with his wife over broadband.

The climax of the wedding came when Xie, who served as the master of ceremonies, asked Wei to perform formal bows in front of the image of his wife on the computer screen. Together they bowed as a gesture of worship of the heaven and earth and respect for Sun's colleagues.

Although the ceremony lasted only nine minutes - Wei and his colleagues had to soon continue their work - the couple found the wedding a poignant symbol. "At such a special time, individuals must make sacrifice for the well-being of others," Sun said.

(China Daily 06/17/2008 page6)