White Day is very much a 'Japanese only' day. On March 14th, White Day, exactly one month after Valentine's day, men who received gifts of chocolate on Valentine's Day are meant to reciprocate by giving a White Day gift to whoever gave to them. Said to have been invented by a marshmallow manufacturer in the 1960's or thereabouts, it is the perfect invention for removing the Japanese obligation one has to always return another gift to the gift giver. What a circle of clever marketing opportunities this creates!
White Day is not celebrated with quite as much enthusiasm as Valentine's Day, but it is catching up. Gifts of marshmallow, white candy and chocolate, and other goods white in color, are the popular choices. It is rumored that a man's affection can be measured by the type of white goods he gives. Marshmallow means love, candy means like, and white chocolate means let's be friends, I think. I'm not sure where white diamonds, or a white Porsche roadster would fit into this formula.
Anyway, as promised, above is a small picture of a small selection of this year's Hello Kitty White Day packaging. It is much softer, and much whiter of course, than the Valentine's Day packs. The gold of February 14th has been replaced by a silver metal phone badge, and the logo is in silver or white. Some packs have a kawaii little Hello Kitty doll inside. The pink metallic marshmallow tin with the old fashioned look, and white logo, is called 'Charmmy Kitty', which I guess means charming Kitty.
She shows no sign at all of slowing down as she approaches that dreaded 'big' birthday!
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