Apparently, it is de rigeur to give out these tokens out the day of Chinese New Year. So ingrained is the practice, that the Firm needs to send out a memo to the non-Chinese attorneys to "remind" them about it.
Call me a conservative narrow minded Pinoy, but I think it's tacky to give money. And the tackiness is multiplied 100 fold by the rather large gold envelopes we're supposed to put the cash in (envelopes actually provided by the Firm).
Funny, this whole practice of handing people envelopes to solicit monetary gifts. I thought I'd escaped that when I left Manila, where the postmen, garbage collectors, and delivery boys leave all sorts of envelopes at your doorstep during Christmas.
It's exactly the same in Hong Kong.
The envelopes are just better looking.
3 comments:
it's ang-pao
it's not actually a form of solicitation, it's just the way the chinese give gifts. new year, christmas, birthday, wedding... instead of big boxes, you get the red and gold envelopes.
in fact, if you were chinese, they wouldn't hand you any envelopes.
so it's not like the fiesta envelope solicitations here, nobody asks for them. i think they just assumed you wouldn't have your own supply.
Everyone got the envelopes. Even the Chinese associates.
I don't think there's anything wrong with solicitation (memo + envelopes), I just wish they'd do it more subtlely.
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