User Comments - bodawei

Posted on: Boxing Day

Only boots as far as I know.

Posted on: Boxing Day

Interesting rodsrandomnumber, thanks for that.

It's not something one thinks of for decades and then suddenly you are reflecting and thinking 'what is this all about'?

There is a clue there in the article about the shopping aspect that hit my nerve. It seems the idea of sales arose in the 1980s - as I've noted above it involved a lot of lobbying of governments to change the rules to allow trading - but as some people here have pointed out, the retailing strategies have gradually changed, so that Boxing Day is settling down in this respect. Our sales run for a month before Christmas - Boxing Day you need a rest. Boxing Day is I think currently a big day for cinemas (but we didn't bother going - why battle the crowds?)

But coincidentally a friend went shopping yesterday and texted us to say that the store they were in was full of Chinese people!

Posted on: Boxing Day

Jenny

'My apologies to the UK listeners especially' - ouch!

I think you know that I think that you still miss the point, your experience in Australia notwithstanding. It is our experience that many Chinese students do not see Australian culture while they are here - unless you spend time with an Australian family I guess it is inevitable that you get a quite superficial understanding of life in your host country. Unless you spend Christmas with Australians you probably do not understand what Boxing Day is about.

In Australia, Boxing Day is a statutory public holiday - it is a family day closely associated with Christmas. Do you really think that we would have a public holiday for shopping?

As for shopping in Australia - it helps to understand that the default position is that shops cannot open on Boxing Day, but certain retailers have been given exceptions. There is some controversy about these exceptions, even to the present day. (See my post from a 2009 article in Sydney.)

Posted on: Boxing Day

No worries veronique - Happy Boxing Day! (It is Boxing Day here for another hour or two.)

I guess that it's a tradition that travelled with the British Empire last century, or the century before that. I read somewhere that the public holiday was legislated in the 1870s (before Australia existed as a nation.) I just finished watching a TV show from the UK in which the kids are calling out 'Happy Boxing Day!' to the visiting grandparents. There were no scenes in a department store or discussion of sales. :)

Posted on: Boxing Day

Hi veronique21. Sadly no, we are talking about the same thing. The intro and dialogue both convey the impression that the significance of Boxing Day is related to big sales. During the lesson Jenny and John do not take us much further than this although John says that the 'etymology' (origin of the word 'Boxing') is uncertain. Boxing Day in Australia is in the top five public holidays along with Christmas Day, Easter Sunday, Good Friday and Anzac Day and it is a day of goodwill designed to remind us about those less fortunate in the community. In a sense it is a continuation of Christmas Day. In my family it was explained along the lines: Christmas Day is for family, but we have Boxing Day to remind us that not everyone is as well off as us.

Boxing Day came to be important for sporting events in Australia and other countries. The Boxing Day Test Match and the start of the Sydney to Hobart yacht race. But it is still an important day for family, as is Spring Festival in China.

In recent years the big stores have run sales on Boxing Day but this is somewhat controversial.

Posted on: Boxing Day

I do not have any religious objections to the tone of this lesson - my previous post may have given that impression. Rather my objections are that it conveys a cultural message that is wrong and perhaps oblivious to those people who celebrate this day as a public holiday. It overlooks the significance of the day. 

Taking the dialogue at face value, any Chinese person expressing these words has not taken the time to ask any one from any of the several countries that celebrate Boxing Day .. or even done an internet search.  It is sometimes said that Chinese people tend to be ignorant of the outside world, and this dialogue reinforces that stereotype. I have never met a mainlander who has said 'isn't Boxing Day all about shopping?' 

On the positive side it gives us the expression for 'sales'. 

Posted on: Boxing Day

.Apparently it's all about shopping?'

In deference to those loyal subjects of the Queen, and even to those republican types could it be possible to edit the intro as follows:

'Apparently it's NOT all about shopping?'

Posted on: Boxing Day

I can't find much 'uncertainty' about the meaning - the debate is whether 'boxing' referred to the boxes containing gifts for the poor and needy, or to the box left at the church for people to put their donations for the poor and needy. Either way it is a day associated with goodwill, much like Christmas Day. 

The growing popularity of sales does cause some controversy. see for example a newspaper article from a couple of years ago: 

The NSW government has toughened restrictions on major retailers opening on Boxing Day under legislation that also prevents shops from forcing staff to work on public holidays.

Religious and community groups had said they were outraged at the extent of Boxing Day trading across NSW last year.

Retailers with exemptions to trade on Boxing Day in the Sydney and Newcastle CBD are unaffected by the new changes, as are small businesses.

But large suburban stores will find it harder to apply for an exemption to trade on a public holiday, and community groups will be able to appeal against exemptions being granted, The Sydney Morning Herald says.

Shopping centre owners will also be prevented from using leases to force small businesses that are tenants to open on restricted days. The legislation renders void any lease that requires a shop to open on Christmas Day, Boxing Day, Good Friday, Easter Sunday or Anzac Day morning.

"Retail workers have made it clear they want more time with their families," the secretary of Unions NSW, Mark Lennon, told the paper.

Posted on: Boxing Day

Oh dear, Boxing Day is not the equivalent of Black Friday in any way that I can think of. 

The etymology is uncertain (apparently - I have never been uncertain about it) but the reason for the public holiday is not associated with  shopping or sales. Even Wikipedia does not say that, does it? Yes there are sales these days, but that is nothing to do with the origin of the public holiday - the sales are a recent phenomenon. It is a day of goodwill, like Christmas. As Ed Tabor says above - it is when you 'box up' gifts,  the original idea was unwanted gifts after Christmas, which were delivered to the less fortunate it the community. 

I'd be interested if any one knows of any specific activities that carry on this tradition - these days the 'boxing up' occurs before Christmas and the boxes are delivered in time for Christmas Day. All the charities are busy doing this just before Christmas. And these days in Australia I guess the Boxing Day tradition does not continue exactly as it used to because people don't want to be identified as requiring some assistance.

I remember one organisation that does this 'boxing up' on a weekly basis, but the rule is that the box is delivered by someone known to the family, a friend, never by a stranger.   

Posted on: Christmas in Chinese

'Boxing day' is a public holiday in Australia. It was originally the day you 'boxed up' unwanted gifts and delivered them to the poor and needy. These days it is known for sales and the start of the summer cricket tests (this year between Australia and India.) Starts 10am tomorrow, live from the MCG. This year it is a short series - just the MCG, SCG, Wacca and Adelaide Oval - each games is scheduled for 5 days, so you can waste a lot of time in front of the TV. And I am definitely not a cricket fan, it's a once a year thing. Oh you might like that - one cricket venue is called the Wacca (strictly I think it is WACA) and another is called the Gabba (which is short for Woolloongabba.)