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Chinese find a way to share Christmas joy with ‘peace apple’
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My first Christmas in China was a nightmare that I’ll never forget.
Despite looking forward to experiencing Christmas in the middle of winter as it’s meant to be experienced (Christmas falls in summertime back in New Zealand), I wasn’t quite expecting to be left in the freezing cold without electricity (no lights, no TV, no showers) for two merry days starting on Christmas Eve.
That was the lovely gift we received at the international students’ dorm of a prominent Shanghai university four years ago: two days without power in the midst of a wintery blast.
“We’re sorry for any inconvenience,” a ratty note stuck to the lift doors read — in Chinese only.
Merry bloody Christmas!
It’s not like I expected Christmas to be a huge thing in China, but you’d at least think the staff of the international dorm would understand that Christmas happens to be one of the Western world’s biggest annual celebrations and put that maintenance work off until at least Boxing Day.
I mean, they knew about Christmas enough to deck the lobby with the obligatory tacky Christmas tree and streamers, and they even sprayed the windows with that fake snow.
Not that they needed to — it snowed that year, not too common an experience in Shanghai.
Fast forward a few years and Christmas in China seems a lot more merry, because it can’t really get much worse!
I know I wrote about China borrowing festivals from the West as not that great of a thing just a few weeks ago, but Chinese Christmas is a rare exception, because it has aspects that are very Chinese, which is unique and fun and a little bit exciting.
The first aspect of Chinese Christmas that I find quite interesting, as a Westerner, is that Christmas is not a holiday here. This probably sounds crazy, but I actually found it quite novel to go to class while my family back home are going through the motions: opening gifts they pretend to like, having small-talk with extended family you only see once a year, and filling up on chocolate and cake.
Another thing I find quite interesting about Christmas in China is that, despite not being considered an actual holiday, you can find huge, beautiful Christmas trees and other displays at all the big malls across Shanghai.
My local mall on Jiangpu Road in Yangpu District is one such example, and every night hundreds of people go there to take selfies and enjoy the atmosphere.
That Christmas spirit is also overpowering inside malls and many stores, with “Jingle Bells” and other Christmas tunes blasting out of every corner, sure to send even the sturdiest employee on a slow path to insanity.
But the cutest thing about Christmas in China — and something that only happens in China — is the giving of a gift called the Peace Apple. You can find these apples for sale in most big supermarkets and fruit shops, but you better get in quick!
What’s special about this apple, you ask? Well nothing, really.
It’s just a red apple packaged in a beautiful box or other beautiful wrapping, that has become a new custom for Chinese, especially very young Chinese.
But why?
It started because Chinese people happen to love playing with homophones (words that sound alike).
Christmas Eve in Chinese translates to ping’an ye (safe and peaceful night), which sounds a little similar to pingguo (apple), and so the ‘peace apple’ was born, a gift that is given on Christmas Eve, symbolizing the hope that the recipient will stay safe and well.
I really like this new element to Christmas that Chinese people have created to help give this otherwise blatant exercise in capitalism a little bit of yiyi (meaning), and I look forward to giving some peace apples this year during my Chinese Christmas here.
EDITOR’S note:
Andy Boreham comes from New Zealand’s capital city, Wellington, and has lived in China, off and on, for the past four years. Now he is living in Shanghai earning a master’s degree in Chinese culture and language at Fudan University. He welcomes your feedback on all of the issues he covers — you can reach him at andy.boreham@shanghaidaily.com.
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