Festive fruit provides food for thought
There was much excitement in the office last week as Spring Festival gifts arrived. The heavy boxes had to be loaded onto trolleys to be distributed to all employees. Soon, desks were piled high with packages of gourmet nuts, wine bottles and olive oil.
Previous experience has taught me not to expect much from workplace gifts. Like getting a voucher at the end of the year to the company’s own store that requires you to put in some of your own hard earned salary to get something half decent. Another employer deemed me ineligible for a Christmas present because I had only worked there five months. Apparently, it took six months to earn some Christmas cheer.
Thankfully, the Spring Festival spirit is a little more generous and just shy of three months into the job, my arms could barely cope with the gift bonanza.
A box of mandarin oranges was the biggest item in the collection — both in size and as a talking point. Apart from giving my slack muscles their hardest workout in weeks, what on earth does one do with so many oranges? It was a question pondered by many of the foreign recipients more accustomed to receiving armloads of candy than citrus fruit.
A little research suggests the main idea is to display the brightly colored fruit at home as it is considered a symbol of abundance and good fortune. Partly because the name for orange in Chinese sounds similar to the word for luck and the glossy skin resembles gold.
But beyond having them in your possession, there’s little information about what to do with them. Chucking these little prosperity-producers into the bin doesn’t seem like the right way to start the Year of the Rooster.
What info is out there, tells me the skin keeps moths away. Not that I’ve seen any moths in Beijing. Driven out by the annual mandarin onslaught perhaps, so better to leave some peel in the cupboard just in case.
As for the stuff inside, the options are paltry. While there are endless recipes that would easily churn through a box of apples, apricots or lemons and fill the house with sweet and savory delights, mandarins have been long overlooked by chefs. One ingredient list included mayonnaise alongside mandarins. No, thank you.
We’ll have to get our creative juices going and create some of our own mandarin-themed dishes and drinks. The latter will ideally involve the alcoholic part of the gift.
At the very least, hopefully the bowl of festive fruit convinces us to pick one of them up rather than heading straight for the snack cupboard. Once the nuts run out, anyway.
Other Chinese New Year customs I’ve encountered are less wholesome. I’ve been repeatedly warned to keep a close eye on my phone as it seems everyone knows someone who has been a victim of pickpockets at this time of year.
I was approached by a stranger at the ATM asking me to withdraw money on his behalf in what I can only assume was some kind of scam. That’s the ugly side of the gift giving spree as family members feel the pressure to fork out for presents they can’t afford.