Museum of broken relationships turns into matchmaker

Just 20 days after the opening of a museum of broken relationships in Taiyuan, capital of North China's Shanxi province, its owner joked that it was turning into a blind date site, thecover.cn reported.

Since it opened to the public on April 25, the museum has received 500 visitors every day, aged between 16 and 25.

The number of its exhibits, ranging from train tickets and an unfinished self-knitted sweater to a wedding dress and a tie with a lipstick mark, has increased by threefold to more than 200. All the objects are left behind from breakups and donated by the public.

People seem to find closure for a broken relationship by donating souvenirs from former lover, Kang Shidong, owner of the museum, told Shanxi's news portal sxrb.com. He said a young man brought a bracelet and spent a whole afternoon writing a note, elaborating his love story.

Besides closure, what surprises Kang is that some visitors fell in love after coming across each other at the museum. "As far as I know, some have entered romantic relationships," said Kang. "I'm happy to see that. The purpose of establishing such a museum is for people to say goodbye to their old relationship and stride into a new one."

The idea of setting up such a museum came to Kang when he visited a museum of broken relationships in Chengdu, capital of Southwest China's Sichuan province, with two friends in January. They thought it would be a good thing for Taiyuan to have a place for people to bury souvenirs from a failed relationship.

They acted fast and opened the museum after three months' preparation.

The world's first museum of broken relationships was founded in Croatia in 2006 by two artists, who ended their four-year relationship and got the idea of setting up a museum to house their leftover personal items.

China has several museums of broken relationships now, in Nanjing, Chengdu, Xi'an, Wuhan, Beijing, Chongqing, Jinan, Harbin, Changsha, Guangzhou and Changchun.