Crazy Eddie’s Saipan Love Brokerage

Most of my pals who remained in the U.S. mainland are digging out of their second divorces about now. Evidently, all is not well in the mainland’s marital front. I get e-mail that goes like so:

“Dear Ed, Sorry I haven’t written in 12 years, my computer was broken. Anyway, you may have heard that Suzie and I divorced recently. By the way, do you know any beautiful women in Asia that might be looking for a husband? Thanks. Joe.”

I find these requests sort of creepy and untoward. I can’t really explain why. I have the same reaction to the losers who think they’re charming when they ask my Filipina wife if—wink, wink—she has any sisters.

In contrast to my mainland clique, my expat friends are typically very happily married, or are very happily not-married. Many went through the U.S. divorce meat grinder once, and none wanted to repeat that experience. Of the married set, I’d say that about 75 percent are now married to Filipinas; Chinese and Korean wives would comprise about 15 percent or so, and, well, your guess is as good as mine on the rest.

And then there’s Phil.

Phil was a warehouse manager for a company I was an executive with before I had made the leap to Saipan. He was far better company than the pinheads and pantywaists in the office wing of the building, so I’d spend as much time as I could playing hooky from my office, and hanging out with Phil in the warehouse.

Phil had got some stubborn notion that he just had to find an exotic wife from Asia. Don’t look at me, I didn’t give him the notion. We worked and lived in a rural part of the U.S., which was hardly a venue amenable to his demographic preferences in the nuptials realm.

Anyway, I moved to Saipan and lost track of Phil entirely. Then, lo and behold, he popped up about eight years later, finding me via my Web site. And he related his tale of woe.

Phil (so the story went) had joined some lonely hearts club sort of thing, and, a year or two later, he wound up flying to Manila to meet the alleged lady of his dreams. Upon his return home, he obtained a fiancee visa for her, and along came the long awaited day of her arrival in the U.S.

And, arrive she did. The bliss lasted for about four days, and then she wandered off, having secured (so Phil had surmised from his phone records) the associations of a number of other men that she was interested in seeing. She was riding the hanky-panky express, U.S.A., and Phil had paid her admission.

He had some real concerns about immigration visa stuff, or liability thereof, I don’t claim to understand it. I guess the authorities take a dim view of a man losing his fiancee like you’d lose a set of car keys.

For their part, economists take a dim view of markets that lose their efficiency because parties that want to cooperate can’t find each other; marriage, too, is an issue of supply and demand, at least at some basic level. We’re up against the bugaboo of information costs here; everyone is convinced that Mr. Right or Mrs. Right are out there, somewhere, but they’re hidden among 7 billion other earthly inhabitants.

And when there is market inefficiency, there is opportunity.

If I had sufficiently mercenary instincts (and I don’t), I’d just hang out my shingle as a love broker. I think matchmaking is an ancient vocation. I probably lack the sales skills, though. I can just imagine my e-mails to clients:

“Dear Mr. X: Your photo was circulated to our vast network of beautiful potential brides, and we regret to inform you that you are too ugly to merit any interest. I invite your attention to paragraph 13, subsection U, part III, of your service contract, which specifies that clients may be excluded from the eligibility pool if they lack esthetic suitability, as defined by ISO 9001.”

Or: “Dear. Ms. Y: After evaluating your enrollment questioner, I suggest that you list ‘rich,’ ‘in poor health,’ and ‘heavy smoker’ as the primary attributes you seek in a husband.”

Saipan, a lively and exotic crossroads of east and west, would be just the place for this. After all, I’ve never seen a place that held such a talent for turning single people married, and married people single. If I add a divorce lawyer to my staff, I’ll be able to cash in at both ends of the process.

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