No ties, no kids and no regrets

Jean Zhou, 32, founder of a film and television company in Beijing, says she rarely thinks about marriage because most of the time she is simply too busy with work.

Zhou started her own business in 2018 after having worked as an executive in a finance company. When she quit she had acquired enough knowledge and built up networks to the extent that she felt well prepared for entrepreneurship, she says.

She now works 14 hours a day, she says, talking with investors, expanding business and managing 10 employees. Shooting of several TV operas that her company is producing will begin next year, she says.

The age of 30 is not a marker that should define what a person should or should not do with one's life, but rather "an optimal time to do things I couldn't do when I was in my 20s". As successful as Zhou has been, she says she feels she can make even greater career achievements when she is in her 40s.

From time to time her parents or other older relatives urge her to find someone to marry, she says.

"They are well-intentioned, but it takes time to establish trust and spot the right person. Not only that, but a failed marriage and divorce could be a real pain.

"Sometimes I think I would be happier if there was someone who gave me companionship, but then again if you get the wrong person it may just mess things up."

China's divorce rate rose from 0.55 percent in 1987 to 1.85 percent in 2009 and to 3.2 percent in 2018. Last year 9.47 million couples married, compared with 12.41 million in 2010. About 4.15 million divorces were registered last year, compared with 2.68 million in 2010, the Ministry of Civil Affairs says.

Zhou says she eventually hopes to find the man who is worth spending the rest of her life with and thinks of having a child one day, but she will not set a timetable.

"As technology advances, women can also give birth to healthy babies at 40 and above."

Ivy Ouyang, 33, who began studying for an MBA degree in New York last year, says she thinks that instead of being unmarried, "lack of life experience overseas is a greater pity in these modern times".

She came up with the idea of studying overseas in 2013, she says, when she felt she was in a career rut. She was a finance journalist who interviewed a lot of high-flyers in various industries and was inspired by their openness of mind and their abilities in cross-cultural communication.

Her parents were at first doubtful about the idea of her studying overseas but she managed to turn them around to her way of thinking.

"It would be harder to return to university studies once I married and had children," she says, adding that of her 800 classmates, half are single and many are above 30.

She is due to graduate next year, she says, and her studies have proved to be a highly enriching experience in which she has had the good fortune to be taught by Nobel Prize laureates or top-level executives, to visit top companies and attend lectures given by global leaders and make friends with people from many walks of life. She likes mixing with people on campus, where there are no ulterior motives, such as money, and she feels younger living in a new environment, she says.

"Apart from that, it seems fewer people care about age."

The two-year study will cost about $160,000. Renting an apartment outside the school costs $3,000 to $4,000 a month. While she has enough money saved to be able to live, her parents pay half of her expenses, she says.

On her 30th birthday she traveled to Africa with her best friend and says she did not feel anxious or like a different person after reaching that milestone.

Growing up should come in the form of "step-by-step progress" so that one knows what kind of life one wants, she says.

Many women in China race into marriage under pressure without sufficient thought or research and end up with quarrels, family violence, divorce and even being killed, she says. The term "leftover women", a stigmatic term for unmarried women in China, is inaccurate, she says.

"We are not unwanted, but a little picky," she laughs.

Speaking of an ideal life, she foresees a supportive husband, one or two children and a job in which she can realize her self-worth.