For some couples, it's a lucky day. For others, it just sounds catchy. For whatever reason, prospective newlyweds around the world all agree that September 9th, 2009, or nine, nine, oh nine, is the perfect day to walk down the aisle.
Meet Mei Yip and Ricky Xie. They are residents of New York City and chose nine, nine, oh nine as their wedding day. For this Chinese American couple, the date is not just a catch phrase. It has special significance in their cultural roots.
The newlywed couple said, "Nine is the symbol of long lasting in Chinese tradition and we want to have as many 9's as possible."
And it's not just Asian Americans, Western couples also chose this special date to walk down the aisle. Wells and her groom Steve tied the knot. But their choice has nothing to do with "the day of eternal love".
Hannah Wells, from Birmingham UK, said, "I like numbers and I like patterns. I was born on the first of the tenth, so that's a nice date and being called Hannah is a palindromic name, the same forwards and backwards, I just like the pattern."
In Germany, nine couples marked the memorable date by getting married on Germany's highest peak, the Zugspitze mountain. Separate ceremonies were held in a restaurant 2 thousand, six hundred meters up. They celebrated with friends and relatives by waving red, heart-shaped balloons.
A court official says there's a wedding frenzy because nine, nine, oh nine is the last date in this century where there will be a sequence of numbers on a given date with a zero. Last year's eight, eight, oh eight was also very popular.
But some new husbands admitted off camera that they chose this date for a very simple reason. It's easier to remember wedding anniversaries.
(CCTV September 10, 2009)
