On a shopping run to my nearest supermarket - inconspicuous out-of-the-way location, somewhat downmarket, exclusively Chinese clientele (but for me) - this evening, I couldn't help but notice an unusually large number of chocolates, dried fruits, and candied nuts on offer.
And we're talking aisle-end display racks here, and special festive packaging.
The Chinese New Year (based on the shifting lunar calendar) is again fairly late this year, not until February 7th. The only other major traditional/family/'religious' Chinese holiday (the Mid-Autumn Festival) in these dark months of the year is safely behind us; as is the major political holiday, the October 1st nation-founding day (the other week-long secular holiday in the annual calendar is not until the Labour Day celebrations at the beginning of May).
So, I can only conclude that this incipient promotional frenzy is for Christmas!!!
Western holidays (Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, Easter.... even Thanksgiving) have been rapidly gaining in popularity in China in recent years; and Christmas is probably the leader amongst these (the impact of Valentine's day is huge - but at least it doesn't drag on for long). However, my observations over the past few years had suggested that it was still largely limited to students (who relish any excuse for a party, and any opportunity to impose upon their 'foreign friends'), and certain of the increasingly affluent middle-class who readily seize on another pretext to 'Westernize' their offspring by showering them with presents. The sales push in my local supermarket would appear to suggest that the holiday is this year being marketed to ordinary Chinese.
I wonder how that will go. I watch with interest.
But I can't help feeling - like my dear blog-friend OMG - that this is way too goddamned early to be rolling out the yo-ho-ho-ness!!
"Hark, the Herald Tribune sings:
'Go and buy expensive things!'"
6 comments:
hahaah i love the jingle.
valentine's in japan drags on for a whole month. it's cruel and unusual. on 2/14 girls buy chocolates for the boys they like. then, if the boy likes them back, he buys them chocolate on white day, 3/14. THE GIRL HAS A MONTH OF SUSPENSE AFTER PUTTING HER HEART ON THE TABLE!! i dont understand who let that happen.
Moonrat - thanks for that tidbit... that does seem to make a frivolous silly "fun" holiday wayyyy too serious. A month? I mean, if he's gotta think about it for a month, the girl's gotta assume when she gets that box of choco that there's some type of commitment attached.
oh, and then I imagine it's mostly played out by over-hormoned teenagers... what a painful thing to watch.
i know almost nothing substantive about Japanese relationship culture and history -- is there some reason for making the guy stop and think about it for so long?
Actually, that sounds way better than the all-on-one-day but in its way equally-protracted-and-painful way in which the 'Western' (read: America's Hallmark greetings card company) festival has developed: chocolates AND flowers AND presents AND dinner - all at outrageously ramped-up prices.
Do Japanese guys, I wonder, spend their month-of-grace beering it up with the other salarymen and considering their options? Or do they start dating the chocolate-giver straight away, but dump her a month later? The latter approach definitely has its appeal....
By the way, the closing jingle is Tom Lehrer's,not mine. But you knew that, right?
Oh no! It's spreading to other continents! To Communist countries, even!?
On Saturday a local radio station was playing Christmas music. Yes, I was irked.
At the above-mentioned supermarket, they have a special Christmas compilation CD of largely forgotten 50s and 60s novelty songs. It plays on continuous loop for most of December. But at least they haven't started it just yet.
Positively surreal. I never thought to hear I saw mommy kissing Santa Claus and All I want for Christmas are my two front teeth in China!!
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