Today is White Day!

The realisation hit me in my office in Tokyo, as I tried to make sense of the JavaScript on my computer screen. Tanaka-san had just given me the code with some cryptic instructions in Japanese. Now it was up to me to figure out what exactly he wanted.

Then I got the mail notification. It was from my dear friend who lives next to my matchbox room in the suburbs of Tokyo. It was addressed to all the Indian denizens of our building.

Fortunately, this time he was not cribbing about my television playing too loud the previous night. Instead, he wanted to remind us that today, March 14, was White Day, and we were having a get-together in the evening.

White Day comes exactly one month after Valentine's Day. I think it is not celebrated in any part of the world except Japan. Its success reflects the agility of Japanese business minds to seize upon any viable commercial idea.

The Japanese are not averse to foreign ideas -- if the ideas are profitable, that is. In fact, they are quite adept at modifying such ideas to fit their society. In a way this explains the success of their economy in such a short period after its complete devastation in the Second World War.

Driven by a thriving retail industry, a cultural penchant for obligatory gift-giving, and a fascination with the West, the Japanese adopted, and adapted, several traditional Western celebrations in the years after the war. Stripped of their meaning and bent to the whims of retailers, these occasions have taken some rather unusual forms over the years.

The same is the case with Valentine's Day here. The image of V-day we carry in our minds is of people giving gifts to their loved ones. But in Japan, the only ones who do the giving are the females, and the gifts are normally chocolates.

Valentine's Day here seems to have its roots in a campaign that a chocolate manufacturer started in 1958. He promoted it as "the day women confess their love to a man with a gift of chocolate".

The manufacturer sold heart-shaped chocolates at a department store in Tokyo. Only five were sold that first year, but the sale became more and more popular with each passing year, and the custom of females sending chocolates to males gradually took root.

Today V-Day has been adopted as a Japanese celebration and now, approximately 60 per cent of the chocolates sold in the country are sold on this day.

But hey, don't get too excited if you get chocolates from a Japanese girl! Those might be giri-choko, or obligatory chocolates. A 'true love' chocolate is called honmei-choko.

The custom here is that women give chocolates not only to their loved ones, but to other male acquaintances as well. Giri-choko is the chocolate given to men such as bosses, colleagues or male friends that women have no romantic interest in. It is given as a token of friendship or gratitude.

The concept of giri is very Japanese. It is a mutual obligation that the Japanese follow when dealing with other people. If someone does you a favour, you are obligated to do something for that person. And so, giri-choko is supposed to be a gift to anyone whom you would like to thank for his help or kindness.

The advertising for Valentine's Day starts in mid-January. Its main focus is not cards, but chocolates. Every grocery store, and just about any other kind of store you can think of, has, during that period, a section devoted to chocolates.

If all this 'giving' by females seems one-sided to you, don't worry. We get our revenge on White Day. Businessmen of Japan, never the ones to miss an opportunity, took advantage of the Japanese feeling of obligation and created W-Day, to help along those poor 'obligated' males who have received chocolates.

While Valentine's Day is an imported convention, White Day is a purely Japanese creation. The driving force behind its popularisation was a company making marshmallows, which launched a campaign in 1965 urging men to repay Valentine's gifts with soft, fluffy marshmallows. The name White Day comes from the colour of the candy, though at first it was called Marshmallow Day.

I hope my next-door friend has picked up a really big box of white candies. It would be a nice change from his constant cribbing about my television.

Shuchi got her chocolates all right.

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