Xu Chenghong counted his relatives and came up with two or three tables. To fill the rest, the 24-year-old Chinese groom invited strangers to his 31 October wedding in Yiliang County, Yunnan, and thousands came.
He posted the invitation on Douyin, TikTok’s Chinese sister app, around 25 October. The video opened with two words, “拜托了”: please, I’m counting on you, Xinhua reported.
He also asked guests to leave their hongbao at home, the red envelopes of cash given for luck, My Modern Met reports.
“When I was 3, my father died of illness. When I was 5, my mother chose to remarry,” he told Cover News.
His grandmother raised him and his brother, three years older. It is why he calls himself an orphan, Mothership reports.
Over three years of dating, Xu saved 167,500 yuan (about US$25,000) for the bride price and the wedding, the South China Morning Post reported in a story syndicated by The Star.
The bride price is the betrothal gift a groom’s family gives the bride’s, one step in planning a Chinese wedding.
A village banquet kept costs down. With so few guests, though, he worried it would feel empty.
His relatives came to only “two or three tables”, he said, so he asked people online to help fill the rest.
He was hoping for 10 to 20, from nearby.
A farmer from Yunnan brought 100 live hens and told him, “We are your family.” Another guest drove more than 2,200 kilometres from Tibet, and others sent roast pigs.
He had asked for no red envelopes. Digital ones poured in anyway.
Cars arrived with plates from Yunnan, Sichuan, Chongqing, Guizhou, Guangdong and Fujian. Guests brought live ducks, freezers and heaters, others offered photography, and volunteer chefs cooked for free.
At the square, more than 100 blessing banners hung on the walls. Businesses took on the couple’s styling and makeup, and one offered a full stay at a postpartum confinement centre.
Others gave drone filming and lighting. One gave the couple a car outright.
Guests in luxury cars formed a motorcade, and Malay Mail says one well-wisher reportedly provided a Maybach for the newlyweds.
His older brother helped with the preparations and gave guests directions.
“People have come all this way, and what I fear most is not letting them eat well,” the brother said.
The banquet was meant for a neighbour’s courtyard. It moved to Hengdianzi Square in Luowang village, several kilometres from Xu’s home, because the courtyard had limited space, Jimu News reported.
“Those who come are guests, and they are our guests,” said Zhang Mei, deputy director of the Zhaotong culture and tourism bureau. She also asked people to send blessings online rather than crowd in.
County and township staff ran traffic control, policing, food safety and crowd flow, and the bureau drew in all 11 of Zhaotong’s counties and districts.
Xu asked drivers to take care on the narrow mountain roads. Many hotels in Luowang township were fully booked, according to the Global Times, citing The Paper.
“Thank you all for travelling so far to attend my wedding,” he told Xinhua. “It was originally just an ordinary wedding, but because of friends from all over, it has taken on a special meaning.”
He met his bride online. The Standard names her as Luo Chui, and together they thanked the crowd: “We have never met, yet everyone is so warm-hearted. Thank you all.”
The crowd grew all week, and so did the numbers:
About 25 October: the invitation goes up on Douyin.
Within two days: nearly 200 visitors, almost all with gifts, per the South China Morning Post.
Afternoon of 28 October: more than 2,000 in the village, by Xu’s own count to The Standard.
29 October: more than a thousand guests gathered at the square, per Cover News.
Wedding day, 31 October: more than 10,000, according to media reports cited by the Global Times.
Afterwards: around 30,000, an unconfirmed figure from the content creator Ur.Chinese.Unc, as Dexerto reported.
If those numbers seem to belong to different weddings, read them by date. Each count caught a different day.
No outlet has a confirmed headcount.
Not everyone bought it. Some critics called the wedding a marketing tactic, the Global Times reported, and questions raised in livestreams left viewers asking whether the invitation had been planned in advance.
Some of the help was organised online. One commenter promised to design and plan the wedding if his comment reached 200 likes. A blogger promised 10,000 roses, and of the 30,000 to 40,000 flowers sent through the internet, most went to waste, Cover News reported.
Xu had saved for three years before any of it. Offered professional planning, he turned it down and asked to “keep everything simple”.
The roses were the internet’s doing. The invitation was his, and no report has shown it was staged.
After the feast, Xu invited his guests to tour the countryside and taste Zhaotong’s apples, which he told Xinhua are “very famous, sweet and delicious”.
His brother had the host’s first rule right: when people come a long way, feed them well.
If your guests are coming from far away, your Wedded Advisor at Wedded Concierge can hold rooms near the venue, and a wedding RSVP website keeps every reply in one place.
He had counted two or three tables. By the end, nobody could count the guests.
Written by
Content and Creative Manager | Wonder Group
Joseph Joshua is the SEO & Content Manager at Wedded Wonderland, bringing an editorial and search strategy perspective to the publication’s coverage of luxury weddings, destination celebrations and bridal lifestyle. His approach to content centres on helping readers move from inspiration to informed decisions, with attention to the design, craftsmanship and personal details that give a celebration its character.
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