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In praise of PJs: Long may they grace our streets
By D. Saint-Leger |
December 2, 2009, Wednesday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
Editor's note:
Are all pajamas an eyesore in public? Our reader D. Saint-Leger says no. He responds to an article in Shanghai Daily on November 27, "No PJs in public-dress for the Expo." Your opinions are welcome.
Article highlights:
Twenty-seven-year-old Linda Lu and her mother often argue about wearing pajamas on the street.
Through her years in Australia, Lu got used to changing into pajamas before going to bed and wearing them only as sleepwear, not casual wear.
"When I first went to Australia, I wasn't aware of the different habits and wore pajamas to the school dining hall," says Lu. "My classmates were really surprised and asked whether I had just come from a pajama party," Lu recalls. She was deeply embarrassed, even more so when classmates asked why Chinese people wore pajamas on the street.
"I feel embarrassed wearing pajamas today, though I know it's common," she says. "But my mom would just call me eccentric if I refuse to wear them. She says changing clothes is a waste of time and energy."
"I like the idea of banning PJs, but it's difficult to persuade my mom. After all, she has lived that way for more than 50 years and she's not going to accept sudden change," says Lu.
Letter to the editor
As a laowai living in Shanghai for six years, I was a bit shocked by Linda's opinion, willing to ban pajamas in the street.
Banning, or willingness to ban this cultural habit seems to me a funny form of "wear correctness."
As for me, and many other laowai, the vision of couples in pajamas in the streets on warm summer nights, is a peaceful and fun expression of freedom, making me feeling at "home" here.
These "freejamas" are an intimate life of the city, precisely making Shanghai (and China) a place with a true personality. A supplement of the soul, in other words.
I fear this young Chinese generation wishes for a standard world, same foods, habits.
Today you ban pajamas, tomorrow you ban the most elegant qipaos?
A cultural habit has to be left alone, it will die slowly if it has to do so, by itself, by people themselves, in a changing world.
But not by strange diktats from conventional fashions or trends from overseas.
Apparently, this young Chinese generation has not fully understood that human diversity is an enormous richness, giving this country its own hallmarks.
And, as compared to the vision of Expo crowds of many obese Westerners, wearing horrible baseball caps, crazy T-shirts (when clean), (body) piercing and sweaty sneakers, a blue or pink pajama appears to me a real elegant outfit.
Inversely to this young Chinese generation, too much Westernized or "banana-ized", I love this country for what it is, not for what it should be.
One problem I have with cold and humid winter is, among others, the disappearance of my dear "freejamas." Fortunately they come back with the leaves on trees and the charming sounds of cicadas during the warmer days.
Back home.
Are all pajamas an eyesore in public? Our reader D. Saint-Leger says no. He responds to an article in Shanghai Daily on November 27, "No PJs in public-dress for the Expo." Your opinions are welcome.
Article highlights:
Twenty-seven-year-old Linda Lu and her mother often argue about wearing pajamas on the street.
Through her years in Australia, Lu got used to changing into pajamas before going to bed and wearing them only as sleepwear, not casual wear.
"When I first went to Australia, I wasn't aware of the different habits and wore pajamas to the school dining hall," says Lu. "My classmates were really surprised and asked whether I had just come from a pajama party," Lu recalls. She was deeply embarrassed, even more so when classmates asked why Chinese people wore pajamas on the street.
"I feel embarrassed wearing pajamas today, though I know it's common," she says. "But my mom would just call me eccentric if I refuse to wear them. She says changing clothes is a waste of time and energy."
"I like the idea of banning PJs, but it's difficult to persuade my mom. After all, she has lived that way for more than 50 years and she's not going to accept sudden change," says Lu.
Letter to the editor
As a laowai living in Shanghai for six years, I was a bit shocked by Linda's opinion, willing to ban pajamas in the street.
Banning, or willingness to ban this cultural habit seems to me a funny form of "wear correctness."
As for me, and many other laowai, the vision of couples in pajamas in the streets on warm summer nights, is a peaceful and fun expression of freedom, making me feeling at "home" here.
These "freejamas" are an intimate life of the city, precisely making Shanghai (and China) a place with a true personality. A supplement of the soul, in other words.
I fear this young Chinese generation wishes for a standard world, same foods, habits.
Today you ban pajamas, tomorrow you ban the most elegant qipaos?
A cultural habit has to be left alone, it will die slowly if it has to do so, by itself, by people themselves, in a changing world.
But not by strange diktats from conventional fashions or trends from overseas.
Apparently, this young Chinese generation has not fully understood that human diversity is an enormous richness, giving this country its own hallmarks.
And, as compared to the vision of Expo crowds of many obese Westerners, wearing horrible baseball caps, crazy T-shirts (when clean), (body) piercing and sweaty sneakers, a blue or pink pajama appears to me a real elegant outfit.
Inversely to this young Chinese generation, too much Westernized or "banana-ized", I love this country for what it is, not for what it should be.
One problem I have with cold and humid winter is, among others, the disappearance of my dear "freejamas." Fortunately they come back with the leaves on trees and the charming sounds of cicadas during the warmer days.
Back home.
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