the family unit

In China, when a man proposes to a woman, the couple is not officially engaged until after they have an engagement party. They don't usually have engagement rings, and they don't usually wear their wedding rings once they marry. There is no way to tell if someone is married just by looking at them.

Divorce is not very common of course, and is pretty severely frowned upon, as is having a child out of wedlock. Chinese immediate families sometimes function almost as if they are not a whole unit though. It is not uncommon for one parent, or even the child, to live in a different city from the rest of the family. Usually this is related to job availability. One parent will go where the good job is, while the other will remain at home with the child. The whole family unit doesn't move because, as a general rule, Chinese do not like change. So, one parent basically acts as a single parent. I have one student that hasn't lived in the same city as her father for ten years.

Family names work a little differently here too. When a couple gets married, the woman does not drop her family name and take her husband's, her name remains the same. The children will take his family name, and possibly hers as well.

Most westerners are also familiar with the one child policy and the fact that Chinese (used to) favor male children. Now they can have more children, they just pay a tax for the second child. Female children are also coming more into favor because apparently you need females to continue a population. Who knew?