Christmas in Shanghai
by Maple, guest blogger, December 25, 2011
At Jing’an Temple in Shanghai |
I don’t know when it started, but my Chinese countrymen have increasingly lost feeling for traditional festivals and become more and more heated up by Western holidays. Even economic depression and “End of the World” panic can’t hold back Shanghai’s fervor to welcome Christmas.
At a mall in Shanghai |
In a place that always leads the fashion trend and where there is no shortage of foreigners and foreign enterprises, it may not be so strange for some people to take this ride for a bit of fun, but when an entire city collectively goes crazy for a foreign holiday, it is a different matter indeed. Here is the humility that goes with Christianity—such respect for others’ cultures must be an overwhelmingly pleasant surprise to the 0.5% of the population in Shanghai that is foreign. So harmonious.
In Shanghai’s Zhengda Square |
Each year, when Christmas approaches, the joyful atmosphere seeps to every corner of the city like overflowing water. When nights fall, the city is ever so gorgeous with lit-up trees, silver flowers and colorful embroideries of light, while Christmas music incessantly drones on. Excited young people dress exquisitely, like flowering branches vying for attention. No matter a big department store or small supermarket, no matter a bank or restaurant, no matter a foreign-invested or domestic enterprise or even a government organization, at every building’s door there is a Christmas tree fully decorated with neon lights and bags of presents. Even small residential enclaves and ordinary hospitals are not spared. So what if you are a Buddhist or Muslim, when you go home or go to the hospital, you get to celebrate Christmas.
In Shanghai’s hotel |
A while ago there was a joke circulating on the internet: in a contest for the most enigmatic department on the earth, the winner is China’s “relevant department” (“有关部门“). I suspect, to place Christmas trees in every corner of Shanghai is the glorious mission of a “relevant department.”
In a residential enclave of Shanghai |
Perhaps people so exhaust their enjoyment during Christmas, that when it actually comes time for our own spring festival, the reaction from both businesses and the populace is fatigued. Besides the dull red lanterns, sausage and smoked pork, plus the CCTV Gala Show that gets worse and worse every year, there is nothing else. Compared with people’s enthusiasm for Christmas, spring festival no doubt is cast in the shadows.
In Shanghai’s supermarket |
Nowadays when commenting on something interesting, the Shanghai idiom goes, “That has some tunes” (“老有腔调的“). Is it because we Chinese are so insipid and constrained in nature that our traditional festivals are spent with fewer and fewer tunes? Otherwise why, when the fun and relaxing foreign holidays such as Halloween, Valentine’s Day, and Christmas are introduced, do we progress from fascination to enthusiastic talk to glad acceptance? As to why Halloween involves masks, where Valentine’s originated or whose birth Christmas is celebrating, no one cares as long as there are big meals to eat, discount goods to buy and colorful decorations to see.
On Christmas Day, beggers at a Shanghai church |
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