Valentine’s Day in Japan was probably one of my first big “What the smeg?” cultural-difference realisations. In fact, I would say that Christmas in Japan is more relatable to the western concept of Valentine’s Day. Read more on how the Japanese celebrate Christmas here.

So, What Do the Japanese Do on Valentine’s Day?

Valentine’s Day is the day in Japan when women give chocolate to men. I smeg you not. This is the entire thing. Men do not gift the women with anything until the following month! The Japanese have their own special day called White Day in which men return the favour to the women they received chocolates from. Read more on that below!

Homemade Love and Obligatory Chocs

On Valentine’s Day, women do not only give chocolate to their partners or the person they are romantically interested in. They also give it to male friends, family members and coworkers. In fact, Japanese women usually make their own chocolate to give out to their special loved ones. Then, they give cheap shop-bought chocolate to everyone else. In the case of coworkers in particular, this is known as ギリチョコ “giri choco”, which means “obligatory chocolate.”

On a side note, I once gave chocolate to my boyfriend at the time and said it was “giri choco” and he got really upset. Don’t say it, even as a joke! (He chilled out later, though).

So, What is White Day?

White Day is on March 14th – exactly a month after Valentine’s Day. On this day, men are expected to do something nice for the main woman in their life. There is a bit of speculation over what the man is supposed to gift the woman, however.

A couple of my Japanese students said that the gift ought to be twice or thrice the price of the chocolate that the woman gave him. Others say that money isn’t an issue and it’s not “calculated” that way.

Apparently though, Japanese men are traditionally supposed to return sweeties or cookies to all the women they got chocolate from on Valentine’s Day. This goes the same for obligatory chocolate too. Alas, there are many opportunistic young Japanese men out there that bend the rules a bit and don’t bother returning the favour, however. This leads to ill feelings on the women’s side, as one can imagine.

Nowadays, White Day has slowly changed to the man treating the main girl in his life to a nice dinner rather than giving her sweets.

And there you have it! Japanese Valentine’s Day in a nutshell.

What do you think of White Day? Should we try and create a day or two of obligatory chocolate- and sweet-gifting in the west too? Or just leave the original day of love as it is?

I’d be interested in reading your comments below, so let me know!

Much love to you all!

Jade xxx