People's Republic of...

Yes, it's almost the start of Golden Week (黄金周; huang jin zhou), as it is optimistically termed, in which about one-sixth of the world's population attempt to board every available train, bus, coach, plane, and boat in an attempt to get somewhere else for a set period of time, and then return again.


As seen in the above image of my computer's calendar, this annual Chinese holiday is technically not really a whole week long. But most workers have between 6 to 9 days off, depending on where the holiday's beginning falls within the week. The first day of this holiday, May 1st, is the 'international worker's day', though here it's simply described as the national holiday.

However, it is a holiday in the sense that it is a (very) welcome respite from work, but it's not a holiday in the sense that one is free to choose one's moments of leisure.

In China, the vast majority of people make some effort to return to their hometowns to visit parents and older relatives, although a new recent trend is, instead, to jet off to a nearby foreign country - especially Thailand - which doesn't celebrate the same golden week, and thus avoid the crowds, traffic and the price-hikes associated with vast public holidays.

No point bitching about everyone being forced to take their breaks at the same time (as I tend to do this annually), or even post images of scenes of human swarms (as Ryan over at 'Life in Suzhou' beat me to it by a good few days - fast work, man!), and instead just quietly hope and pray that in the years to come the rather socialist attitude towards human activity will soften into a more Euro-American mood of allowing individuals two weeks of holiday time, at their leisure, and at their discretion.