Shenrancaijing original
Author | Tang Yahua Zou Shuai Wang Min Li Qiuhan Wanqi
Edit | Wanqi
Valentine's Day on February 14 is coming soon.
For couples, this is a special and romantic holiday. Shen Yan chatted with five young people and found that when they first started their relationship, in order to create a sense of ceremony, most of them would go to great lengths to give gifts to each other or create surprises. These pasts, of course, are very good memories, but also cherished days.
But they are also wondering, is it really necessary to spend a lot of energy and time on this day? In this festival that has been surrounded by various businesses' publicity, can blindly follow the trend and consume some inapplicable goods, can it really enhance the feelings of the two people?
Some rational couples, began to refuse to fall into the trap of consumerism, starting from the actual needs, even if only spent a small amount of money, but also achieved a romantic effect, at the same time, they are more concerned about emotional needs, the two sides accompany each other on this day, is the best Valentine's Day gift.
The reason for this change is that even if the other party is carefully selected as a gift, most of them do not apply, and even cause waste. Some are because the "sense of ritual" of expressing love for each other has long been embedded in the bits and pieces of daily life.
Most of the young couples are still struggling, relying on each other to support each other, in order to plan for the future, no longer go out shopping, eat, but meet at home to watch movies, cook, share the time of the two; and some have bought expensive watches to express their hearts, but found that it is not as warm as making a meal for each other at home; some have completed the love run, they are already "old husbands and wives", do not care about ordinary gift-giving forms, but directly give each other a need.
Fortunately, although each couple gets along differently, they have found the most suitable way to get along in the run-in.
I prefer him to make breakfast for me than to spend time and money on holidays
Yuanyuan | 30 years old Internet practitioner
When I first fell in love, I still paid more attention to Valentine's Day, 520, Tanabata and other festivals, after all, this is a unique and ritualistic festival between couples. We celebrate the holidays together, we commemorate how many Valentine's Day we spent together, and we will also prepare gifts for each other.
But now, we have been together for 7 years, the work is very busy, the two have a stable relationship, and there is not so much energy to spend time. In addition, preparing gifts for both parties is also a headache.
My family's daily necessities, including both of our things, are basically bought by me, and buying gifts for the holidays will be one of the few times he shops a year. As a straight man, you can imagine what you can choose.
For example, he bought me a necklace online one year, happily took it out for me to wear that morning, and when I came home at night, I found that the necklace had faded. He himself was also embarrassed and could only go to the merchant to ask for a return.
After stepping through the pit of quality problems, the following year, he rushed to the mall counter on Valentine's Day to buy me a necklace, this time the quality was of course no problem, but it cost thousands of dollars. Think about this kind of festival full of consumerist traps, the shopping guide meets a man who rushes to choose gifts, and it is difficult to think of wrongdoing.
He also helped me buy some watches and bags, and I can see that a lot of thought has been put into it. It's just that this is not the area he often pays attention to, in the choice of style, measurement of price, he is not good at, it is easy to spend money, things are not satisfactory.
Of course, I also have problems when I buy him gifts. For example, he never used the men's skin care products I bought him, he only washed his face with water, did not apply anything, and the gifts are still idle. Later, I only bought him practical items such as razors, clothes, shoes, etc., but these things were bought when they were needed every day, and there was no need to give them as gifts.
In my opinion, the sense of ceremony and romantic form between couples is different from person to person, and we are both pragmatic and less concerned about flashy things.
This year's Valentine's Day is not planned, one is in time for the weekday, we are both very busy every day, and there is no new way to celebrate the festival, such as eating, watching movies, sending flowers, these are not very meaningful, just changed his mobile phone and bought clothes a few years ago. Usually, I can do everything I want to do directly, and there is no need to be on this day.
I think that the other party's attention to me, care and understanding is the most critical, not how to spend the holiday. He is originally a person who is not very romantic, asking him to express romance in the way of sweet pet dramas, there is no need, I can feel the sincerity in what he does.
For example, if I get up late in the morning and don't eat breakfast for a long time, he will recently deliberately get up early to make breakfast, and then go to work after eating the part that I left behind. For me, this kind of daily romance is very useful, which is also a "love to the right person, Valentine's Day every day" lifestyle.
If it's just Valentine's Day, and I don't pay attention to it every day, and there is no performance of love, it will definitely not work. Between couples, it's important to find ways to express love and romance.
Plan to save money for the future, and it's good to cook at home on Valentine's Day
Morning Sun | 25 years old in the media industry
My boyfriend and I have been together for two years.
We are all very ritualistic people, when we were first together, every Valentine's Day, Tanabata, Christmas and other holidays, we have to design a lot of tricks, prepare very expensive gifts.
After all, just in love, everyone has the enthusiasm to plan a surprise, and in the early stage of love, by buying what gifts and preparing to use carelessly, you can also see what kind of attitude the two people have towards holidays, romance, and rituals, which seem to be not necessary for life. To put it simply, through the festival, it can be seen whether the attitude of life between couples is the same frequency.
Once during a holiday, I learned to do a "cave music" on the Internet. Making it into a game is still quite troublesome, you have to prepare the problem in advance, design where to hide the gift, arrange what gifts will be triggered by the problem of each link, and add side quests, guess gifts, and so on. The best gift was AJ and the cheapest was a bag of sweets. At that time, the process of playing was very interesting, and the gift had to prepare more than ten and cost a lot of money.
Now that we have been working outside for a while, we also want to start planning for the future, saving up small vaults and minimizing too cumbersome forms of festivals.
Valentine's Day is still a weekday this year, and we've made an appointment to leave work early in the evening and have a meal at home. Two people chatting and huddled together at night to watch a movie. Of course, gifts are also prepared, but saying that you want to save money will be a little lower than the previous grade.
Spending a lot of money does not mean that the other party can be satisfied, the important thing is to see how much thought is spent. He once made me a bag and scarf and bought a bottle of perfume. It might be a few hundred bucks to see the price, but he did it for a month. Another time I said I liked glass flowers, and he bought them back and made them for several days. I love all these things.
My measure is the weight of the effort, not how much it costs.
My ideal Valentine's Day is to have a sense of ceremony and play romance without spending a lot of money. We both usually work overtime, the time to get home at night is different, and sometimes we come home tired and don't want to say anything. This time it was Valentine's Day and took a moment to spend time with the people you liked.
The other party was touched by the grand festival but was complained about, and then chose to make a list of gifts
Wenshu | 29 years old Internet practitioner
I had just turned three years with my girlfriend, and the first confession was on the phone, and we both felt that it was not formal enough, but it was exactly half a month before Valentine's Day, and I planned to take the opportunity of Valentine's Day to make a good confession.
So I started choosing a restaurant, watching roses, picking out gifts, and preparing handwritten letters. At that time, worried that the restaurant I went to every day had no characteristics, I also specially stepped on the line in advance, and finally set a quiet environment, blue tones as the main atmosphere, a more romantic restaurant.
On Valentine's Day, taking advantage of the lunch break, I first went to the flower shop to pick up the 99 roses that had been ordered, sent the handwritten letter and the cosmetics gift box I bought to the reserved restaurant, and instructed the clerk to deliver it in the evening after we sat down.
In the evening, my girlfriend and I waited for flowers to be delivered, and she was still very surprised after reading the handwritten letter. At that time, it cost about 1800 yuan before and after, although the money was not the most expensive, it was the most thoughtful and ritualistic Valentine's Day, which achieved 80% of the effect I expected.
However, although I bought big-name cosmetics, I was spat on by her, and of the seven or eight things there, only one or two of them she thought were OK and could be used.
It is also after the failure experience of this gift box, the two of us discussed, do not "surprise", do not blindly send, in advance to say what you need, it is best to be specific to a specific model.
If my girlfriend had anything she wanted but hesitated when placing an order, she told me and I wrote it down on the gift list. Every time I encounter a special day, I pick some from the list and buy it for her. Similarly, she had a list of gifts for me there.
Last year and the previous year's Valentine's Day, we were all in our hometowns and could not spend together. Only after returning to Beijing did they make up gifts for each other.
This Valentine's Day, I plan to spend early with my girlfriend, go out for a hot pot on Sunday, and go shopping. This time, the girlfriend wants an iPad, which can be bought for her, even if it is a holiday gift.
Workers are not free of time, the working day is busy, if you also plan some activities, it is very energy-consuming. Obviously, both sides have something to do, and it may not be practical to spend energy on the holiday. I think that if two people are too tired, Valentine's Day will lose its original meaning.
Fortunately, my girlfriend is not particularly fond of "joining in the fun", and the sense of ceremony is not particularly strong. She once said that before she graduated from college, she rarely ate cake exclusively on her birthday.
Although I don't go to celebrate Valentine's Day very solemnly, every year around the Spring Festival or her birthday, I will use the material I usually shoot to make a small video to record the things I have done with her, which is also very ritualistic.
The 30 gifts make us happy, and the 3000 gifts have dust in the drawer
Gong Xiaohua | 29 years old, a practitioner in the pharmaceutical industry
I've been with my partner for 7 years, and except for a few times when I happened to spend time with my family in my hometown, I'll have a good Valentine's Day. But mostly he gave me gifts, and I only bought them for him on his birthday.
When they first got together, he didn't have any money in his hands, and sometimes he bought potted plants as gifts on the way from work. The most impressive thing is that in 2018, he just changed careers, paid 3,000 yuan a month, and gave me a 500 yuan comb on Valentine's Day. I love this gift, it's ingenious, it can be used every day, and it can be treasured. But I was very sad about money, and while my heart was very sweet, I thought in my heart that this person really wouldn't spend money.
Then his career improved, and one year on Valentine's Day, he gave me a watch. I don't love watches and find it impractical, he explained that he saw that other people's girlfriends all had a good watch and wanted to give me one. I was curious about the price, but watching him painstakingly choose a gift and asking the price directly was too hurtful, I put up with it. After taking a photo to search online, the price is more than 3,000 yuan.
I was surprised and happy, and at the same time I was still a little overwhelmed, and secretly observed that his colleagues also wore watches, and later on his birthday I also gave him a watch of the same price.
However, I prefer the 500-piece comb of the year, which is still in use today. We didn't wear those two watches behind them, and they were about to become collectibles. This incident, aside from the two of us's concerns for each other, also made me feel that we had fallen into the trap of consumerism a little bit.
I was actually a very easy person to satisfy, and he invited me to a barbecue, which was also a festival. We will also observe each other to see what the other may need, and give some necessities of life to each other on such festivals, and we will not burn too much money.
The happiest time I remember him was that I made him a meal as a gift. In fact, it cost 30 yuan to buy vegetables, and it took an hour to cook, but he happily played a video to his mother and showed off that I cooked for him.
In fact, gifts have nothing to do with the price, mainly the heart, even if you want to have a sense of ceremony on Valentine's Day, you don't need to spend money to get it, usually you have each other in your heart, but the festival is not so important. This Valentine's Day, I am too busy at work, there is a very important job to complete, there is no time to take care of it, it is not over.
There is no new idea in giving gifts, and it will directly give each other "needs"
Don Meili | 27-year-old doctor
I've been in love with my partner for four years, been married for five years, and rarely officially celebrate Valentine's Day.
We were in love from the beginning of our freshman year. At the beginning of the holiday, when he was still a boyfriend, he would send flowers, lipstick, clothes and the like. I am very happy to receive these gifts and will feel that the other person values me enough. At that time, I was still in school, returning to the dormitory with gifts, and my roommates were envious. I also send a circle of friends every time, which can be regarded as satisfying my vanity.
However, after work, he can earn money, these things can be bought at any time if he wants to buy every day, the purchase link is transferred to the object, he does not say a word about direct payment, and then receive similar gifts after the holiday, and he will not feel how surprised.
Of course, it is also related to the novelty of the other party's choice of gifts. He buys the same things every year, and sometimes I don't like the style and color of the clothes I send, which is a waste of money, and I have to pretend to be very happy, which is really unnecessary. And he is also a very low-key and introverted person, who does not like to join in the fun, nor will he engage in some special surprises.
After getting married, especially after having a baby, we put more energy and attention on the baby. And we are all doctors, sometimes on the night shift, it is difficult for both sides to make up the right time, so that Valentine's Day is often missed, if you think of it, it is also to take the baby out to eat together.
We have been in love for nine years from love to marriage, and we are very familiar with each other, and if we suddenly and formally go to the festival on this day, we feel too deliberate, but we are not adaptable.
However, couples still need a sense of ceremony to get along with each other. I will not let him go shopping now, the most I can do is to send a bouquet of flowers to be happy, but I will not waste the opportunity to celebrate the holiday, but change my thinking and say some ideas that I usually feel "excessive". Like last year, I told him that he didn't need to prepare gifts for Valentine's Day, but wanted to go out alone and give a trip fund.
He didn't agree at first, thinking my idea was strange, so he might as well buy me something directly. However, under my strong persuasion, he acquiesced, which meant that he would be a full-time dad during the time I was traveling. I went to Dunhuang with a friend on November last year, and he didn't look for me at home at all, and I had a lot of fun.
This Valentine's Day, I have already thought about it, and I will directly tell him to get a fitness card. As a reward, I've bought him a pair of shoes I like.
In fact, girls still hope that the other party can pay attention to Valentine's Day, but if the other party is not good at buying things, and they don't like it, it is better to take advantage of this holiday and put forward their own ideas, which is also very good.
*The caption and the accompanying images in the text are from Pexels. At the request of the interviewees, Yuan Yuan, Chenyang, Wen Shu, Gong Xiaohua, and Tang Meili were pseudonyms.