Yes I agree love is kind of warm and charming feeling.
Ok, back to your question: Are you willing to let love "just happen"?
No, just because I am old and wise enough to know what is my type. I won’t let love just happen until I am sure he is good and worthy enough for my devotion.:) Good Luck here!

@newbeginning

WOW !!!!!!! Given the chance, this could become one hell of a serious topic!
As a western man with a great deal of experience with Chinese women, the short answer has to be NO!

You say you have been 'around' for 18 months or so, so let me ask you - How many Chinese women have asked you how soon you can marry them ?

I have a really good Chinese friend (girl) - she is 28 now and I have known her since she was 23. I love her to bits (as a mate) and we do confide in each other
Recently her father CHOSE a 'husband' for her and essentially kept her a prisoner in her own home until she agreed to marry

She told me - "I will marry him because my father wishes it, but if after 1 year I find that I do not love him, then I will divorce'

I am shocked!

This is essentially an 'arranged marriage' - something that I thought belonged in the dark-ages and some Indian and Muslim countries

Yet it is amazingly common in China!

Marry first and then let love 'grow' - if it does not, then divorce!

As a westerner I find it hard to swallow - we all know that we should love first, then marry - right ?

I was once contacted by a Chinese woman who simply asked me - "How soon can you come here and marry me?" - This was a woman who I had never even chatted to, let alone MET!

Women like this were the inspiration of my blog series about the various 'types' of Chinese women you are likely to meet on a dating site

@sandy339 confirms this

I have a good friend in the UK that I have known for 30+ years. I introduced him to CLM after his divorce
He met a girl and after 2 months chatting he went to see her - for one week!

They had a great time together and now she is asking him to return to China later this year in order to marry

He is kind-of..... "Whoa girl, slow down a bit" - but as far as she is concerned there is no option

It is my belief that she is in danger of simply frightening him away - in which case he will feel like he has had a 'lucky escape' and she will feel he is nothing more than a 'bastard'

I have said it before (many times) that if a Chinese woman decides to seek a western man then she should slow down a little and learn to understand western cultures

Just because WE (as western men seeking a Chinese partner) should not mean that we can accept the 'marry-now-love-later' attitude that so many Chinese women appear to have

Here is my limited assessment on the topic...

In China, it doesn't 'just happen'...it must be 'forced' because
- it has a time and a place (28years old is getting close to 'panic' for single girls),
- it has a risk in career (unmarried women are overlooked in jobs because they could 'fall pregnant' within a year of being married),
- it has a negative popularity cult (left-over women are despised as being 'broken' or 'barren' or 'untouchable'),
- it is true that collectivism (family values) always beats individualism (modern society) in the current China,
- it is demanded (retired parents 'demand' a child to give them something to do in retirement and to continue the family line), children are 'hounded' into complying.
- it has a stigma in society and community (divorced woman caused it themselves),
- it has masculine approval (respect for males) and feminine subservience,
- it has a penalty in the family (being forced to care for parents into your old age),
- it has a 'need' for support of children and family into old age (limited healthcare and services)
- it is a feeling...many Chinese do not expect to fall in love and marry, they expect to marry and grow into mutual respect for each other...this is a hard one because it doesn't exactly translate into other languages...in China people have 'feelings', but rarely express it as western 'love'.
- it has family power relationships - some marriages are 'created' to build power-bases and alliances in business, politics and society.
- it has a 'tradition' - marriage is the only possible 'state' for an honourable Chinese woman
- It has a 'cult following' - your happiness was dictated to you (your career was selected based on the needs of the country, your passions were crushed and your abilities broken by education and realities of making money and supporting your family)

and a few more as well!!!

Of course this is changing slowly - but the country has only been 'open' for 30 years and this current generation (post 90's) is the first that has easier access to extended (and personal choice) education, access to 'external stimuli' (internet, movies and external cultures) and have more 'choices' in career and life direction - most have not known family or shortage as their parents have nor have heard about strife and restriction that rules the lives of their grandparents. But this generation also faces extreme pressures due to one-child/2 dependant parents and enormous disparity in wealth and opportunity as well as a 'loss of identity' in not having strong ideology in their lives (be that religion or State).

If you are looking at the ladies on this site - you will notice that many have been 'forced' into their situation by their society and their family and their 'traditions'...and their reaction is to quickly 'force' they way out of it as soon as opportunity shows itself.

There you have it, the plight of Chinese women in a nutshell! From a purely self-centred, Western chauvinistic viewpoint, nonetheless!

I wanted to say thank you to Sandy, Paul and Gareth for your replies, I enjoyed your feedback and incites.

I am very surprised at the lack of feedback from our Chinese women members.....


NB

Well,it takes some time to read the forum?I would like to say something here. Yes, some of us can marry with a man easily or fast in your idea. As I know most of the chinese lady they are responsible for their family, they are homely and taking care of their family very well. That's a love .It is a great and beautiful love for a man and a family from the lady, isn’t it? Is it easy? or is it difficult? Are you willing to marry with such a lady or are you looking for a lady just for fun or the marriage under love, which from someone say it is a strong feeling from each other?
The question is how much do you know about the chinese lady? And how much do you really know about chinese culture?

Some more, some Chinese ladies they are enthusiastic, open, they have a lot of feelings and love in a relationship. They are seeking for the love from a man and a relationship, as feelings and love is so important than others for them. They are letting love in and letting it just happen. So do you think they are still difficult? Or they would be married without a love to a man?

As some of you might know how difficult and complex of the chinese lady .And some of you might know how easy going of the chinese lady. It is sure that we can be complex and we can be easy going as well.

So how to judge about the Chinese lady under the topic of love? And how do you know there will be no love in a relation? It is hard.

@newbeginnings

“I am very surprised at the lack of feedback from our Chinese women members.

Firstly, let me apologize for not being a Chinese woman member of CLM.

However, my partner is Chinese and she has single Chinese girlfriends and I almost make a hobby of studying relationships, both Western and Chinese and I have some understanding of the Chinese matchmaking process.

I can make a list of qualities that all of the Chinese women I know want.
Good man
Good heart
financially secure
reasonable appearance (seen by friends and family as a good physical match)
better or equal education

One more thing that I can add to the list is “matching horoscope” . I am not comfortable with superstition but I just found out a few days ago that because I am a DRAGON and my partner is a HORSE and that is just one more reason for us being a great match.

Mutual interest in Chinese/Western culture is a given in any successful Chinese woman/Western man relationship.

My partner and I knew each other for 3 years before we became boyfriend/girlfriend. It was another 6 months before our relationship became fully public. My partner carefully coached me on how to behave in front of her family and friends. She was very clever. It is only now that I realize how much I was being coached. I am now loved by her friends and family and I would like to think it is because I am such a good guy but the real reason is that my image to her important others has been carefully stage managed. I have since witnessed the matchmaking of a Chinese woman and Chinese man and I have noticed that it is not just a man and woman that need to orientate correctly to match up, their whole families need to orientate correctly. In the West there is an illusion that a man and a woman can have a relationship independent of others. Even Romeo and Juliet found out that was impossible.

Another fallacy that seems to be present is the idea that love in the West is stronger than love in China. I think the percentage of couples who truly love each other is about the same in both cultures. However in both cultures the percentage of couples who truly love each other is low.
My partner loves me, but when you are committed to looking after your mother(as she is) until the day her mother dies, love is not enough. My partner also tells me that I am her first and last western man. If we did not work out she would never have tried to be with a western man or any other man again.

Neither my partner, nor I, just let love happen. You could say we resisted love and we only let go when we knew there was a safety net below us. Some might say this is not romantic. Our relationship was hard won. We fully love, respect, trust and treasure each other. There are two different paths we could have followed into our loving relationship. I am now glad that we took the difficult path of hard work rather than the free fall path of just letting it happen.

Regardless of what other what guise, identity, As long as the soul, nothing can stop love happening