This is a sequel to Seeing The People Who Couldn’t See.
At my high school, people love to “love.”
This is somewhat of an uncommon occurrence, though. In China, most high schools have a strict ban on dating—giving the act a derogatory name of early dating. It’s believed to be an immoral act, as is said in the Confucian ideals deeply ingrained in Chinese minds. Plus, “early dating” is considered to unduly take up precious time for studying for the gaokao1, which is literally people’s lifelines in high school. No wonder why schools and parents hold such a strong grudge against it.
Our international school, however, is more open and conducive to such acts. That’s why you’d see new couples on social media every day. These couple announcements have a format to it. First, the couple must post at the exact same time. Second, the content of their posts must be a single picture that shows their hands in the same frame. And finally, the picture must be accompanied by a cheesy, “romantic” line from a TikTok song. People would comment “99” under the post, meaning “long live the romance.”2 The purported couple would then regularly post pictures of themselves for a couple of months. After that, the posts would suddenly disappear. People who wonder what happened would soon find that the couple is no longer. Rinse and repeat.
No offense, but I have always found this whole “couple” business to have a degree of hypocrisy to it. People seem to find it fashionable to date someone. If you don’t have your own lover, you might just be a nerd! And love seemed like just that—make a social media post, and break up a few months later. At some point, I even drowned myself in the notion that dating is a necessity in high school. Maybe that’s why, when it comes to choosing a topic for a school science research project, I decided to work along the lines of romance. Specifically, the romance of people with visual impairments. My reason for choosing this topic is manifold. One of my classmates recommended this topic. Additionally, my curiosity has already been piqued by the ongoing wave of dating at my high school. Finally, romance and visual impairments sounded like an interesting intersection that would be worth exploring.
And off I went, along with my friend Benjamin, who has been working on Beacon3 with me. Supposedly, we discovered a research gap: most of the available literature tries to “fit” sighted romantic standards on people with visual impairments. Instead, our work would allow people with visual impairments to speak up directly, building theory from that. We had a fancy title: “Love Unseen: A Grounded Theory of Mate Selection of Working Adults with Visual Impairments.” Such a grandiose goal is—of course—just a silver lining. We weren’t trying to revolutionize academia with a dumb high school paper. We were just a little bit curious.
The first hurdle came soon enough: who were we going to interview? We had no idea. It felt inappropriate to ask the high school students I’d been teaching English. But beyond them, we had no one. And, being introverted, we were too embarrassed to post cold recruitment calls in public group chats—we didn’t want to look desperate! That’s when Ms. Liang, our instructor, came to the rescue. She had been frequenting a local blind massage center and knew someone there—Mr. Li, who agreed to work with us without hesitation. Just like that, we had our first participant.
After adding his WeChat, we curiously peeked at his profile picture. He looked just like a stereotypical middle-aged man. His head was a rounded cube and almost bald, and he gave off the vibe of a not-so-cultured man walking half-naked on the street. After a few minutes, a voice message popped up: “Hello, if there’s anything I can help with, please let me know.” It was a surprisingly soft voice, in sharp contrast with his picture—just like a university student, to the point where it almost sounded AI-generated. “That’s interesting,” I thought.
We also had to prepare our interview plan. Looking back, it was funny how we didn’t realize just how ridiculous some of our questions were. They looked good enough on paper, but once the rehearsals began, the whole thing fell apart. Most of the questions were so cringy that we couldn’t continue the rehearsal, and some questions were entirely unanswerable on the spot.
BEN: (clears his throat, sounding formal) Greetings, Mr. Lin. I am Benjamin, a student from Beijing Academy, and we would like to invite you to participate in an interview regarding the mate selection preferences of individuals with visual impairments. For research purposes, we would like to record your…
LIN: (distorted face, wincing) Okay, okay… (grimaces)
BEN: (reading the script) Okay, so Mr. Lin, what are the characteristics that define your ideal partner?
LIN: (deadpan) Uhh… I don’t know?
(Everyone laughs.)
The night before the interview, I was nervous. I had never really interviewed someone before, and I didn’t know what would happen. Mr. Li the massage therapist appeared in my dream. He was consistently expressionless, dismissing all of our questions with a disheartening remark: “That’s not even a question!” After we asked several more, it seemed like he has had it, and his image shattered into a million pieces. I was startled awake in the dead silence of the night.
It was Saturday and time for the interview! I sat in front of my computer, as we started the video call and hopped inside. And there he was, Mr. Li, right in front of the screen. He looked exactly like his profile picture, but the voice no longer felt disconnected from the person. He sat in the shade near the front steps of a worn concrete building, sunlight bouncing off his black glasses. Behind him, there was another woman in the distance, dozing off in the sun, and once in a while, I could hear the chattering of some passersby.
Mr. Li was incredibly friendly and always smiled and nodded, lifting much of my tension. Yet despite his friendliness, interviewing was hard. After just a few short minutes, I ran out of questions to ask. An awkward silence began, and I began to sweat. I pounded “What’s next???” to Ben, hoping that he had something brilliant in mind. But thankfully, a few seconds later, Ms. Liang gently chimed in to add a quick, observant question and save us from the awkward silence.
There were a couple of interesting discoveries during the interview. For one, I was surprised to learn that people with VI still care about the appearance of their partners. When asked about how, Mr. Li told us that he would ask his coworkers at the massage center. Mr. Li also repeatedly stressed the importance of the so-called “pragmatism” in a relationship. According to him, some young people nowadays are overly “fickle” and could benefit from being more down to earth.
I think it’s common sense that everyone, including us VIs, care about the appearance of our partners. Of course, my wife is very beautiful. And I can ask my sighted friends about how they look like, “is she well-fitted,” and stuff.
Otherwise, nothing was particularly surprising. In fact, the interview almost seemed bland, and I didn’t feel like I made much out of it. Friendly as he was, he always spoke in a matter-of-fact tone and repeated a lot of stuff, making me rather bored in the end. To be fair, I expected much more from the interview. A brand new perspective! What do people with visual impairments think? Turns out, people with visual impairments don’t really think much differently about love than sighted people, to my great disappointment.
Nevertheless, I was still very grateful for Mr. Li’s willingness to accept our interview request. He contributed greatly to our research project. At the end of the interview, however, something big happened. “My wife is right here too,” he said casually, “basking in the sun. She can talk too if you want.” I burst with a huge smile on my face, and even though Ben had his camera off, I could tell that he did, too. “That’d be incredible!” I said. What would the story be like from the wife’s side? That was the question that lingered in my heart as I waited through the remainder of the week for the interview.
It was Saturday again. Interview time! This time, I no longer dreamed of a picture breaking into a million pieces. After a quick breakfast, I was back in front of the computer. “You here?” I typed to Ben. Soon, the video call started. Ms. Mi was here. She was also a massage therapist. And indeed, she was beautiful. We started with the common question: “So, Ms. Mi, can you tell me more about how you met Mr. Li?” I didn’t know what to expect, but the moment she began speaking, I knew it wasn’t just another interview. It was something different. Her voice was calm, thoughtful, and every sentence entered my heart with surprising weight.
Ms. Mi4 and Mr. Li were family friends during high school, but because they were a few years apart, they didn’t really spend much time together. After high school, they had become affectionate towards each other. Yet Mi was afraid. She was fully blind, while Li was only partially blind. She was worried that she might be a hindrance to Li.
To be honest, I had my affection towards him, and he probably had it for me too.
A few years later, Mi was at home, jobless, cutting away through the family savings. She felt like she was a hindrance to everybody. She didn’t know where to go next. She was getting close to 30 years old, and it was probably time to start a family, she thought. “So our in-laws set us up.”
“Well, as for why Li… there are three reasons.
First, he is filial.
Second, he is responsible.
Third, he is kind.
I think these are the three most important points for anyone starting a family, especially for a girl finding a boy. If you’re filial, as in you treat your parents kindly, then you won’t be too bad to a girl. And then, if you are kind, you won’t step out of the boundaries.”
“Li is incredibly considerate and attentive. Well, I am, of course, a person with disabilities. I have four siblings, and I feel like my parents pamper me a bit more, because they’re afraid that I might feel inferior. After the marriage, I’m a bit spoiled, but Li would always tell me what’s best for me. Soon enough, I grew mature as well, and entered the family of my own accord. I can’t imagine life without Li teaching me along the way.”
“How did I overcome the feeling that I was a hindrance? Well, I think it had all to do with Li. He gave me the confidence to seek what I wanted in life. And with his help, I was able to work as well. We worked together and for our family. We became independent. Some say that marriage puts shackles on people, but it was after I got married when I became truly free. I was able to live… No, we were able to live.”
I was in complete awe. I remember going over the rest of the interview only semi-conscious, still mesmerized by the power of love. “Thank you so much, Ms. Mi, for your time,” I remember concluding without thinking.
The call ended and the screen went dark. I sat there for a moment, my hands still on the keyboard. A warm, fuzzy feeling went up my head. It wasn’t dramatic. It wasn’t poetic. It wasn’t something on Instagram. It was… real. The kind of real that stays with you. For the first time, I felt like I saw what love truly is. It definitely isn’t just something on social media. Instead, it’s support; it’s kindness; it’s responsibility.
So that was it—something unexpected that I learned during a school research project. Before, I thought love had to be loud to be real. But I learned that sometimes, what truly is love is invisible to the eye. A few months ago, I learned to see the people who couldn’t see. This time, I learned to love as they do.
(Jun 17, 2025)
- Gaokao is China’s national college admissions exam. Competition is fierce. Many schools force students to study from 6 in the morning to 10 at night—taking as much time as possible. ↩︎
- “99” is pronounced jǐu jǐu in Chinese. “Long live the romance” is pronounced cháng cháng jǐu jǐu. I hope you can see the parallels. ↩︎
- One of our projects on accessibility. ↩︎
- Transcripts published with permission. Participant names have been partially anonymized. ↩︎