I cradled the mini snickers bars and gold coins in my freshly manicured hands. It was my Valentine’s Gift from my one true love. We don’t do flowers or boxed candy anymore. We will do something we’d do for ourselves on any day the week– with a twist. And this year, it’s celebrating Valentine’s Day in South Korea. The biggest twist yet.
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Celebrating Valentines Day in South Korea
Oh, my bad he did bring me Reese’s Peanut butter cup from the commissary. We started the day with couples pedicures and massages. Ending it with Indian food in front of the TV and beers at two of his favorite pubs. I had no idea, Valentines Day was even celebrated in South Korea. That is until our waiter handed my husband a handful of chocolates. Luckily, the chocolates were for me.
The Twist
Like most things in South Korea, Valentine’s Day is magnified. The holiday has been co-opted and reconstructed into something else. Sure it started off as a marketing campaign to sell chocolate (sound familiar), but it soon morphed into an even larger marketing campaign to sell more chocolate, jewelry, and even speed dating venues. That shouldn’t surprise you, Korea really likes to outdo themselves whenever possible.
Setting the Stage for Celebrating Valentines Day in South Korea
My husband says Korea is more or less a life-size version of a sappy love song. I tend to agree, Valentines Day seems to be celebrated every single day of the year:
- Stores that sell matching outfits from the top of their heads to their tiny feet. During the summer it was hard not to gag, for some reason a lot of them looked like they were searching for Waldo. It’s bad enough already when it looks like they shop at the same store anyway. Come on guys, your jeans shouldn’t be that tight.
- Couples walk around arm-in-arm on Valentine’s Day in South Korea like someone will snatch one of them away at an instant. What’s weird is that girls do and so do guys and it makes sit hard to traverse the already crowded streets.
- Meals are always shared. It seems sweet, but no you can’t have some of my fries.
- Love Motels cater to them because they usually live at home until marriage (and sometimes even afterward because of costs) so they are looking for “alone time”. I have to do a story on this one day, but I’m having a hard time convincing my husband to go to one.
- Ever watch Korean TV? Aside from the 20 minutes of commercials to every 30 minutes of the show, they draw little hearts, wigs, and emoticons on everything, even the news.
- Young boys are sometimes just as pretty as the girls and tend to wear their emotions on their sleeves and mascara on their eyes.
The last one is in no way fact-based; it’s solely my own limited observations.
Valentines Day in South Korea
Not unlike our unofficial holiday in America, Valentine’s Day in Korea is February 14th too. However, the Korean tradition is for Korean girls to give chocolate to their significant other or the boy their crushing on.
The department stores have huge displays of red and pink hearts and in good Korean fashion, boxed sets of candy everywhere. I also witnessed the exchange of flowers and romantic dinners.
You might say, this doesn’t seem fair, why are men on the receiving end of these chocolatey treats?
White Day
Celebrated a full month after Valentine’s Day in South Korea is the opportunity for the men to reciprocate with chocolate gifts. Although it’s not uncommon for them to spend 3x as much on the woman of their affections. It is celebrated on March 14th and you guessed it, concocted by the candy industry to sell more candy. Other industries stepped into market luxury items like jewelry, handbags, and perfumes. And if that’s not enough.
Black Day
Celebrating Black Day a month later, it’s dedicated to all the “losers” who didn’t receive a gift on the preceding Valentines or White Day. I actually can’t wait to witness this– you know the whole train wreck thing.
They supposedly dress in black and socialize in large groups where they eat black food like Jajangmyeon, a noodle dish flavored with black bean paste, and commiserate over being single.
So what do you sell to a bunch of socially inept people– dating services.
Matchmakers and speed dating companies realized the potential to make money, so you’ll see a lot of advertising for their services around this time for Valentine’s Day in South Korea.
Rose Day
Finally, held on the 15 May, Rose Day, also called Yellow Day. Many couples dress in yellow and exchange roses to celebrate. They also get engaged or announce their engagements. Singles that didn’t have their fill of lonely-heart noodles on Black Day have the chance to fill up on yellow curry and hope in the hopes of spicing up their love lives.
The marketing is working. Korea is built for consumerism and Valentine’s Day.
They embrace it wholeheartedly. And I see it every day. I live next to two large department stores. There is always a line of cars vying for the limited parking spaces. Steady traffic from open to close.
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Comments
Great post!
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Thanks!
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Shamim
You’re welcome, thanks for your support.
I love your article, it’s interesting and fun! Although I don’t celebrate V Day, I would love to be in South Korea once in order to experience all of this ‘love madness’
I don’t really celebrate it much either, but its fun to see all the hoopla in South Korea.
This was such an interesting read. I had no idea that Valentine’s day was such a huge commercialised thing in South Korea. Emotions do sell like hot cakes. I am sure though there is a lot of pure joy and affection between those celebrating. Love your manicure BTW:)
lol, thanks. It was definitely a sight to see.
Wishing 4 you a very happy valentines day.
Thank you so much. I wish you one too!! Thank you for your support.
Valentines Day in Korea is much like ours in the US. Nice that the girls give chocolate to their boyfriends.
So true, its a fun day for most people.
I had no idea that there were so many days to celebrate love in South Korea. That is so cool!
Thanks, and thanks for your support.
This was so neat; I love to learn about other cultures. The idea of different themed days is so cool, and I imagine really great for keeping the passion in a relationship!
Thanks Amber, com back again soon.
And here I was thinking that we’ve overdone ourselves with all the Valentine’s day tradition. I think Korea has a more elaborate but fun way of celebrating Valentine’s! It would be cool to experience it at least once!
Not even close, lol.
Wow…this is so different. Here it’s definitely the men who do the giving, and the women never give back gifts later on. I mean they do, but in different ways. I loved learning about how differently they do it there.
Lol, I know. Not sure I want to start that tradition, right??
Awe this is so sweet. I had no idea that they did it this way! I kind of LOVE it! How cool!
I love hearing about the holidays and traditions of other cultures. I find it one of the most interesting things to read.
being asian, cheesy korean soap operas is a must and i must say this traditions are somehow spread out asian countries, lol
Lol, I still watch them from time to time.
I love other cultures and how they celebrate beloved holidays. This would be fun to experience.
Cute Korean traditions ! Specially rose day, I know they’re commercial more than anything but I can’t help to love these traditions, im such a cheeseball 😛
I have been to South Korea before. I went to Seoul. It’s a really lovely place especially on winter time.
I hear it’s the same way in Japan. My dad’s girlfriend is Japanese, and he says he finds it surprising that HE is the one getting the flowers and chocolate :p
I bet he’s not complaining either. lol
This makes me want to visit South Korea just to celebrate it there. I’ve never been to Asia. Would love to travel there!
I would be gagging too if I saw those matching outfits. I think it is hilarious they have a Black Day to celebrate the losers. Lol.
This was really informative I did not know any of this. Korea seems like a sweet and romantic country.
Wow! Their Valentine’s day is celebrated much more than I imagined they would celebrate it. I think it’s really fascinating, there are so many “days” to watch our for and each one has a valid enough reason to celebrate, I guess.
I was completely unaware of how big Valentines day was in South Korea! I think that piece of their culture is just great!
How interesting! My husband was in Korea for a year. I’ll ask him about this. Granted, he probably wasn’t paying attention. Black Day sounds amusing to me.
My husband did say he watched some Korean TV and was slightly traumatized, ha.
This makes me feel like visiting South Korea just to celebrate it there. Its going to be an excellent opportunity for me to visit Asia in general.
I am so shocked to learn these facts about South Korea. I think that it is funny that they have things “drawn” on the screen during the news. And the matching outfits are too much! lol
Wow, if Valentine’s day in S Korea is so amazing then I would love to be there next year.
Time is going by so fast Valentine is in a couple weeks. I wasn’t aware that South Korea had so many great Valentine’s Day traditions.
I’ve been to South Korea and it was amazing. I loved how you really took time to learn more and thus celebrating together.
My student once told me about how Koreans mend broken hearts together during Black Day and it’s funny being narrated by a 10-year-old. I actually like the taste of Jajangmyeon!
Love the Korean tradition of the girls giving chocolate to their boyfriends! Super interesting to learn about other cultures too!
It sounds like South Korea have some wonderful traditions for Valentine’s Day and that is such a lovely place to spend some time.