BEIJING, Aug. 10 -- Marriage registration offices in Shanghai yesterday handled the massive turnout of couples seeking to tie the knot on the lucky date of the Olympic Games Opening Ceremony, despite fears of queues, chaos and grueling waits.

    By 4pm yesterday 6,418 couples had attended district marriage registration offices to obtain marriage certificates. Another 67 couples divorced yesterday.

    The registration offices, however, were not crowded and disordered as expected as they had made emergency plans to meet the "marriage peak."

    Xue Wen, 27, was surprised to find that she and her fiance got their marriage certificate within 10 minutes of arriving at the marriage registration office in Yangpu District yesterday. She said she expected to wait in line for a whole day as officials had warned there would be masses of people seeking to get married.

    "We thought we would have had to wait for centuries in the registration office, but we still picked the day to get married because it is so memorable," she said. "Now we're pleased as we can spend the day waiting for the opening ceremony instead of getting a certificate."

    Xuhui District marriage registration office opened at 4:30am, the earliest in the city and four hours earlier than the usual opening time. More than 220 couples had obtained their marriage certificate by 8am.

    Xu Xinghai and his bride Liu Qin were the first couple in the city to get the certificate - at 5am. "We came here about 1am," said Xu. "We knew that many people would come today, so we planned to come early."

    In Yangpu District the line of couples soon to be wed moved quickly. "Last night most of our staff stayed in the office to make certificates and pack the gifts to give to the couples," said Wang Haiyan, director of the Yangpu marriage registration office.

    Wang said they thought the office would not hold the number of people expected to turn up, so they set aside two extra venues where couples could wait.

    However, the extra venues were not necessary as the process went so smoothly. "We had already registered the new couples' personal information and given them physical examinations," said Wang. "And today the couples just needed to check their information."

    (Source: Shanghai Daily)