I would like to ask how long does a tradition last in a folk. A way of behaving that has been characteristic of a population for millenniums and now can be found also in the people belonging to it but no more living in their country.
There is a little Chinese restaurant near to my apartment. The cook and the owners are a small Chinese family, as far as I could see there is a couple and a brother. They are all between thirty and forty years old, not thin, with straight dark hair and almond-shaped eyes. One day they were waiting on the steps of the entrance door of their restaurant. It was a cloudy day, it was not raining, but the sky was white and bright. The Chinese lady was holding a thin pink paper umbrella in her hands, open above her head.
When I was in China, people explained me that still now it is very important to have a white skin, as tanned people are associated to peasants, which get a darker skin color by working all day long in the fields. I could see in Beijing and Shanghai elegant business women holding white lace umbrellas to prevent their skin to become darker when walking around the town from one office to the other. I remember to see the same umbrellas and the same behavior a lot of times in Venice or in Berlin when Chinese groups of tourists go around the town.
I remember reading about the same attitude of aristocratic European women, who used to go to the beach because of the healthy sea air, but were all covered for not tanning their white skins. Now, it became almost the opposite: people who pass in an office most of their time pay extra money for one hour of tanning in a saloon, as the fashion tells us, tanned is cool, suggests sport and health - although it has been scientifically shown that too much of it uncontrolled causes skin cancer. This new and opposite trend is not that old, but became the new fashion also in upper classes. It took maybe from before the first world war to twenty years ago, so basically about 80 years. Is this a lot? To me, it seems quite short for such an inversion.
So I wonder, how long will the old tradition of Chinese umbrellas for the sun last? And more interestingly, what is needed to change a tradition? Is this only a fashion trend, or is the symptom of bigger changes in the society and life styles? And will the change be quicker for people outside their home country, or will this happen in the same way?
There is a little Chinese restaurant near to my apartment. The cook and the owners are a small Chinese family, as far as I could see there is a couple and a brother. They are all between thirty and forty years old, not thin, with straight dark hair and almond-shaped eyes. One day they were waiting on the steps of the entrance door of their restaurant. It was a cloudy day, it was not raining, but the sky was white and bright. The Chinese lady was holding a thin pink paper umbrella in her hands, open above her head.
When I was in China, people explained me that still now it is very important to have a white skin, as tanned people are associated to peasants, which get a darker skin color by working all day long in the fields. I could see in Beijing and Shanghai elegant business women holding white lace umbrellas to prevent their skin to become darker when walking around the town from one office to the other. I remember to see the same umbrellas and the same behavior a lot of times in Venice or in Berlin when Chinese groups of tourists go around the town.
I remember reading about the same attitude of aristocratic European women, who used to go to the beach because of the healthy sea air, but were all covered for not tanning their white skins. Now, it became almost the opposite: people who pass in an office most of their time pay extra money for one hour of tanning in a saloon, as the fashion tells us, tanned is cool, suggests sport and health - although it has been scientifically shown that too much of it uncontrolled causes skin cancer. This new and opposite trend is not that old, but became the new fashion also in upper classes. It took maybe from before the first world war to twenty years ago, so basically about 80 years. Is this a lot? To me, it seems quite short for such an inversion.
So I wonder, how long will the old tradition of Chinese umbrellas for the sun last? And more interestingly, what is needed to change a tradition? Is this only a fashion trend, or is the symptom of bigger changes in the society and life styles? And will the change be quicker for people outside their home country, or will this happen in the same way?
No comments:
Post a Comment