Couple Recreates Wedding After 70 Years Of Loving Marriage
Do you believe in love at first sight? While some will dismiss instant infatuation as temporary and frivolous, one couple might change your mind on the subject.
Cao Yuehua and Wang Deyi have been married for 70 years. After falling in love at first sight in the 1940s, the couple’s whirlwind romance proved it had the chops to last over the long haul. With their marriage stronger than ever, the two decided to recreate their wedding day photos in celebration of their 70th wedding anniversary.
Their story sounds like one of those perfect fairytale romances fit for a date movie. Cao met Wang in 1943 in Kunming, Yunnan Province, at a dance. The two were both originally from Shanghai but never met before.
The dance, held for Chinese citizens who fled during the outbreak of World War II, brought the two together for the first time, and according to their children, it was love at first sight.
“My dad asked my mom for a dance and they fell in love with each other almost at first sight,” recalled their son, 60-year-old Cao Pangpei. “That’s it. That’s how my father met my mother.”
Despite a blossoming young love, Cao was immediately called away to India to serve as an interpreter for the U.S. military under the supervision of General Joseph Stilwell. The order came down so fast, Cao didn’t even have time to tell Wang or leave a note for her.
On his way to the airport, he spotted a friend and shouted to him to “tell Wang Deyi I am heading for India.”
“He was an interpreter, not a soldier. Certainly, he was frightened by the bullets and bombs in the real battlefield,” Cao Pangpei recalled. “He told my mom that she was the first one that came into his mind when he was desperately crouching in the damp trenches.”
They kept in touch through the mail, and as soon as Cao returned in 1945, he whisked Wang away to be married at Northern Hot Springs Park in Southwest China.
Now, 70 years later and with the help of their children, they are recreating their wedding day.
Their 70-year love has been an inspiration to family and friends, including the couple’s children.
“They have been together for so long,” Cao Pangpei mused. “Going through the war, the political turmoil and diseases, and can still stay with each other and love each other.”
So what’s the secret to a love that lasts a lifetime? After the ceremony, the elder Cao said that couples simply “need to care for each other.”
“I think of her at any time, and so does she.”
Even though both Cao and Wang are 98, she’s looking forward to celebrating many more milestones. “When we are both 100-years-old, we will come back again, okay?”
