21 weddings and a funeral

Spotted yesterday by St. Michael’s Cathedral in the port city of Qingdao: a Chinese applicant for the Ministry of Silly Walks. This is how to woo a lady. It clearly worked.

That afternoon, lazing on Qingdao’s accurately named ‘No. 1 Beach’, my friend counted how many girls we could see in wedding dresses, having their photos taken. (I don’t say ‘brides’, because it wasn’t necessarily their wedding day. Chinese wedding albums are lavish, expensive, Tolstoy thick affairs, around which a thriving industry has evolved, and which often take a whole day to shoot – sometimes long after the wedding itself.)

The final tally, all in one wide panorama: 21.

And the funeral? This poor octopus’s, who rests in peace in the ocean of my belly.