Never try to do a blog post after 11 pm at night and three glasses of wine. WordPress hates me. It totally deleted two paragraphs worth of text and I am so not happy about it.
This was going to be a totally awesome post on Valentine’s Day as it is celebrated in the US and Japan, but not gonna happen. You’ll have to settle for the short version since WordPress ate my first draft.
On Valentine’s Day in Japan you will have wives buy something special for their husband or girlfriends for their boyfriends. But, you also have this interesting twist called giri choco, which translates to “obligatory chocolate.” In other words, don’t forget to pick up some chocolate for your boss and all those male colleagues you work with. Nowadays, it isn’t as obligatory as it used to be (depending on your company and how traditional it is). Chalk that up to women’s power and equality in the workplace. But, it still happens a lot and female workers do complain even as they fill their shopping baskets with chocolate box after chocolate box. And if you didn’t catch it, Valentine’s Day is all about the women giving to the men.
But, there’s payback. Word has it that the candy companies didn’t want the chocolate makers to have all the action so they created “White Day.” On March 14th, exactly one month later, men are supposed to return a gift of cookies or candy to those who gave them chocolate.
What’s interesting is the new variation called tomo choco, which means “friend chocolate.” Young girls don’t need to bother giving chocolate to a guy. They make chocolate and give it to their girlfriends. I have yet to hear of guys doing the same, and frankly I don’t see that happening anytime soon.
As for me, I got chocolate for all the men in my life. 
It isn’t obligatory. It’s just ‘cuz I love ‘em!
