国产热热热精品,亚洲视频久久】日韩,三级婷婷在线久久,99人妻精品视频,精品九热人人肉肉在线,AV东京热一区二区,91po在线视频观看,久久激情宗合,青青草黄色手机视频

USEUROPEAFRICAASIA 中文雙語(yǔ)Fran?ais
China
Home / China / Top Stories

Christmas in China: jazz Santa, Smurfs and toy trains

By Agence France-Presse | China Daily | Updated: 2014-12-22 07:43

Christmas has exploded in China in recent years, with marketeers using everything from saxophones to Smurfs to steam trains to get shoppers to open their wallets.

Anyone walking into a shopping mall is welcomed by an orgy of festive cheer: Shop windows are bedecked with plastic Christmas trees, garlands and baubles, while the strains of "Jingle Bells" fill the air.

Christmas is celebrated widely across Asia, particularly in commercial centers like Japan and Hong Kong, where it has become a major shopping holiday shorn of most religious trappings.

It has particularly gathered momentum in China since 2010, when then vice-president Xi Jinping - now the country's head of state - popped into Father Christmas' cabin during a visit to Finland.

"At shopping malls, Santa has become a promotional tool for pushing Christmas sales - and Chinese like to shop," said Sara Jane Ho, founder of a finishing school popular among Beijing's wealthy.

This year she has noted the proliferation of young Father Christmases, his traditional beard and rounded belly replaced by a saxophone.

"The saxophone is seen as a very Western thing, and Santa Claus is seen as a very Western thing, so it's almost natural they go together," said Ho.

Last year, a shopping mall in Shanxi province featured a giant Father Christmas, the edge of his jacket lifted as if caught by a gust of breeze in emulation of the iconic image of Marilyn Monroe.

This Christmas craze is mainly limited to young urbanites from the middle or upper classes.

"At my home in the country, people don't celebrate Christmas," said Guo Dengxiu, a migrant from eastern Anhui province. "By contrast, their children who have moved to the city celebrate it: On Dec 24, they meet with friends and go out to have fun."

But Chinese traditional holidays, such as Lunar New Year celebrations, remain more important occasions for families to get together, professor Benoit Vermander from Fudan University in Shanghai told AFP.

He said he sees China's love of Christmas as "a close mixture between attraction to 'globalized' Western customs and a fascination with religion, which is clearly shown by the popularity of Christianity in the big cities of the East".

Editor's picks
Copyright 1995 - . All rights reserved. The content (including but not limited to text, photo, multimedia information, etc) published in this site belongs to China Daily Information Co (CDIC). Without written authorization from CDIC, such content shall not be republished or used in any form. Note: Browsers with 1024*768 or higher resolution are suggested for this site.
License for publishing multimedia online 0108263

Registration Number: 130349
FOLLOW US
贡山| 奈曼旗| 靖江市| 洛宁县| 江西省| 郧西县| 虹口区| 景谷| 贵德县| 甘肃省| 佛山市| 海门市| 三都| 宜州市| 松溪县| 曲麻莱县| 合阳县| 胶州市| 和田县| 亳州市| 民乐县| 海丰县| 陵水| 蓬莱市| 博湖县| 南昌县| 庄浪县| 柳河县| 娄底市| 贺兰县| 友谊县| 十堰市| 尼木县| 馆陶县| 临朐县| 赫章县| 隆林| 宿州市| 临澧县| 鲁甸县| 大厂|