Another Hallmark holiday, another day of finding a tie that corresponds with the holiday color. The time to give flowers, candy and stuffed animals in the office so as to rub it into the face of the other unloved workers. It's always fun to sit in the breakroom and hear the gossip of others bitch about how so-and-so got flowers. I give a hearty "harumph" to that nonsense. Y'all American girls have it easy. You get to sit back and get gifts. Seems that the marketing execs in Japan and Korea are a bit better than the ones in the US. Valentine's Day in the Far East has become a much more expensive day:

From Wikipedia:

Thanks to a concentrated marketing effort, Valentine's Day has emerged in Japan and Korea as a day on which women, and less commonly men, give candy, chocolate or flowers to people they like. This has become an obligation for many women. Those who work in offices end up giving chocolates to all their male co-workers, sometimes at significant personal expense.

Take THAT, women. But, alas, it wouldn't be fair to force women to such harsh ways. So, again, the marketing execs in Asia came up with White Day, which is celebrated on March 14. On "White Day", all the men who received presents and gifts reciprocate with white chocolate, marshmellows and the such. Again, those fucking Japs are ingenious, as cheap men are easily rooted out. You can't wait for the Valentine Day shit to go on sale as it's all red; you give out some punk-ass dark chocolate or red candies...well you're gonna be sitting on the floor eating sushi all by yourself.

But, those sneaky execs ain't done. In Korea, they realized that, hey, what about the losers who got zilch? Well, they came up with "Black Day", which is celebrated on April 14. On this day, all the single people in South Korea get together and commiserate their un-dateableness by eating noodles together. Normally, in the US, we don't need a special day alotted to drowning one's loneliness in food and drink; it's a daily occurrence. But I guess those Koreans have a better grip on their psyche. Still, if I lived across the border from Crazy Kim, I guess I too would be focused on living every day to the fullest.

Posted by Victor on Wednesday, February 14, 2007 at 2:00 PM | Permalink