What's White Day???

This past Thursday, as I'm sure all of you are aware, was Valentines Day. I'm not really the type who has any strong opinions about this holiday. Some people freak out and get all love sick, some people get all depressed because they have no one to get love sick about, I just don't care... it's a day. It was a slightly more amusing day, however, in Japan. I'm continuously amazed by Japan's ability to transform something relatively plain and simple into something utterly different and complex. Valentines day of course was no exception and on this occasion the Japanese have actually managed to mangle two holidays out of one! The first day is February 14, what we Americans call Valentines Day, and on this day ONLY women give chocolate to the men. Women will give chocolate to the guys they are married to, dating, or crushing on, but there is also the "obligatory chocolate" that Japanese women must give to all their male co-workers. Since the Japanese version of Valentines Day kind of sucks for the women, a while back a couple of chocolate companies literally invented a new holiday called White Day. This holiday is celebrated some time in March, possibly March 14, and on this day all the men have to give chocolate back to the women who gave them some on Valentines Day. Yeah, I wasn't joking when I said it was complex, and the craziest part of all is that no one goes out on dates on Valentines Day OR White Day, they do that on Christmas! I did luck out a little bit because a few of my students still brought me some chocolate, my male co-worker even said to me, "Why did they bring YOU chocolate? You're a GIRL!". Never the less, I was a dutiful Japanese worker and I bought him some obligatory chocolate, so now he has to buy me some next month (and I've heard they double the chocolate prices on White Day!).