Is your Valentine's Day bliss or Cupid miss?
(China Daily)
Updated: 2004-02-13 23:07

No one seems to have noticed exactly when the shabby, cynical young guitar player at the World Trade Centre subway station began singing his sad Valentine's Day song.

But every time 29-year-old Juliet Meng, a public relations staffer hears it, she says she doubts whether the singer wrote the song himself.

That's because no one who has spent a lonely Valentine's Day and is expecting to suffer another could've written those words, or could sing them without experiencing such desperation.

With the falling Saturday, Meng said she was feeling increasingly uneasy.

"Probably, I should just buy myself a bunch of roses to keep from losing face before my younger subordinates,'' she said, her eyebrows furrowed.

For married people, there's another kind of uneasiness.

There's a tendency among some to worry that romance may be going on behind their back.

The Wanma Law Firm in Hangzhou, the capital of East China's Zhejiang Province, enjoys a surging business as Valentine's Day approaches, officials there say.

That's because many suspicious wedded people expect the special day to be a break-through moment to collect evidence of infidelity by their spouses.

Although the threshold price for an investigation by the law firm has risen from the usual 15,000 yuan (US$1,811.6) to 20,000 (US$2,415.5), the demand still far exceeds the supply. So far, inquiries comprising 5 per cent of the law firm's businesses, however.

On the Internet, people can display their feelings in a different way on the day that is devoted to lovers.

At one of the most popular chat rooms in China at www.sina.com.cn, many people send out bold invitations from behind disguised cyber names to strangers to become their "Valentine's Day lovers.''

"The special day deserves some special memory and should not be wasted,'' said an Internet surfer in Shanghai, who called himself California Sunshine.

Of course, some Chinese are really enjoying the experience. Besides those having found a love to share their day, some are celebrating the crass commercial profit of the event.

As earlier as by the middle of last week, most good restaurants in Shanghai have been booked solid .

The price of one red rose has risen to 15 yuan (US$1.8) in most local florist's in Beijing by Friday.

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