ST, July 10, 2006
Husband: 84. Wife: 30
But Nobel laureate Yang Chen Ning and his wife are a picture of
wedded bliss
THERE is quite a spring in the step of Nobel physics laureate Yang
Chen Ning these days, and friends are wondering: Does his wife Weng
Fan, 30, have anything to do with it?
Yang, a co-winner of the 1957 Nobel Prize in physics and who turns
84 in September, is currently in town to give talks at the 37th
International Physics Olympiad at Nanyang Technological
University.
But it is the 54-year gap between the China-born American and his
bride that has given the media a field day since they wed early
last year.
'It's mutual. He also makes me happy,' Ms Weng told Lianhe Zaobao
in an interview published yesterday.
Media pictures here and in Taiwan, where he and his wife stopped
over before coming to Singapore, have shown the sprightly Yang
holding Ms Weng's hand as they appeared at events.
In Taiwan, Prof Yang was even asked if his wife was pregnant, to
which he said 'no'.
Ms Weng said she encouraged him to take vitamins and cooked Chinese
herbal soups for him.
She is Prof Yang's second wife; his first wife Tu Chih Li died in
2003.
The present Mrs Yang met her husband at a physics seminar in 1995,
at Shantou University in China's Guangdong province. She was then
working as an interpreter and happened to be on hand to help Prof
Yang and his then wife out.
In February 2004, the two reportedly met again - and this time the
sparks really flew.
When he and Ms Weng, a divorcee, got engaged over the phone that
year, Prof Yang said she was his 'last gift from God'.
They seem like any other married couple today, talking about
everything under the sun and visiting art museums.
'We are happy together... We don't talk about profound things. We
may not talk about philosophy or life. We talk about everything,'
she said when Lianhe Zaobao interviewed her with her husband.
She also let on that her husband often gives her mathematical
questions to work on, to test her mettle.
For his part, Prof Yang said they play a game at the end of their
museum jaunts.
'I will ask her, what painting will you pick if the museum were to
give you one? That's to see if we pick the same painting. This way,
we have many topics to discuss.'
He also called her 'guileless'. As he put it: 'I described her as
guileless when I first knew her. Two years later, she is still so.
This is her trait. She is also not aggressive and will not attempt
to change the world.'
What of her opinion of him then?
Ms Weng said: 'He is an interesting person... he never makes me
feel down. He has moral character and that's best about him.'
Asked by Taiwan reporters about his life before marriage, Prof Yang
said his friends would see him sitting alone on his sofa in his
study with a television set.
'They always said I must be very lonely,' he said. Now, with
MsWeng, he said smilingly: 'I don't need to say anything.'
He added that elderly people were prone to falls while moving
about, but holding Ms Weng's hand made him feel secure.
