Do you remember the trending Chinese wedding of a 24-year-old orphan I wrote about on Saturday? I mean the one that over 10,000 people attended because he came on Douyin (Chinese version of TikTok) to beg strangers to help make his big day a huge success because he didn’t have enough guests to cover 3 tables. Yes, that young man EXPLICITLY turned down all forms of cash gifts. Read that again. He told everyone, online and offline: “I don’t want any cash gift. I just want you to stay safe and take care of your belongings.” That was it. The crowd at the wedding venue (turned festival) was so large that they started begging people online to stop coming. When I read about him turning down cash gifts, I asked myself two questions: 1 — Who raised this young man? How can an orphan be so contented? 2 — Can this ever happen in Africa that someone will look at this “glorious” opportunity and say no to money? By virtue of the popularity of his event, this couple, Xu and Chuichui would have raised millions of Chinese Yuan but he proved to the whole world that it wasn’t about the money for them. Talk about contentment being a great gain, this couple had it in excess. Here in Africa where wedding is a fundraising opportunity, Xu would have added it as one of the favour of God after gathering money he doesn’t need just to satisfy his greed. Like they say it to justify greed, “Even Dangote still dey find money.” I don’t know about you, but I’m learning a whole lot here. Even though I wouldn’t have turned down any form of cash gifts (except by divine instruction sha), I have learned to keep letting my transparency and honesty speak even in little details. Nigerian celebrities who stage parties just to raise money for personal gain (not charity work) from their rich friends left the chatroom. #chinawedding #chinatraditionalwedding #wedding - @emenikeng