Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA. I'm Steve Ember.
FAITH LAPIDUS:
And I'm Faith Lapidus. These are important days for makers of sweets and sellers of flowers. For owners of fine restaurants and publishers of greeting cards. For salespeople at clothing stores. And for all the people whose job is to make other people's hair and fingernails look their best.
STEVE EMBER:
These are important days because soon it will be February fourteenth, Valentine's Day. This week on our program, we ask three generations of people what the holiday for love and romance means to them.
FAITH LAPIDUS:
We begin with the youngest generation. Sixteen-year-old Jarrah was with a group of Chinese students visiting the United States. What does Valentine's Day mean to her?
JARRAH: "I know that's a Western festival for lovers who date or they love each other. We are not allowed to date in high school."
She explains that some people in China may celebrate Valentine's Day, but China also has its own version. It is based on the story of a fairy from heaven who comes to Earth and marries a cowhand on a farm. In the end, they are permitted to meet just once a year, on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month.
JARRAH: "There's a girl named Zhi Nu and a boy named Niu Lang. Now they are stars in the sky, so they meet each other in lunar months, seventh in July, each year once. We celebrate that day like the Valentine's Day in Western culture."
STEVE EMBER:
So how did February fourteenth come to be celebrated as it is? Explanations date back to ancient Rome. But nothing is sure, not even the identity of the Roman Catholic saint celebrated by this day. As a result, in nineteen sixty-nine, the church removed Saint Valentine's Day from its official worldwide calendar of Catholic feasts.
But the popular meaning of Valentine's Day continues to capture hearts around the world, even if not always on February fourteenth. Camile and Nietzsche were among a group of Brazilian Youth Ambassadors visiting the United States.
CAMILE: "We have Valentine's Day but in a different day. It's June twelfth."
NIETZSCHE: "So in Brazil, I would translate as 'the Day of the Couple. And it's like you don't give friends or family gifts, you give your boyfriend or your girlfriend. And the guys, they are sometimes pretty boring because they like to give chocolate and flowers. And girls are tired and sick of that."
CAMILE: "Yeah!"
NIETZSCHE: "So I believe I'd better give a hot Brazilian kiss. It would be better on the Day of the Couple."
(MUSIC)
FAITH LAPIDUS:
Next, we talk to some college students. Jack Feldman is from Iowa in the American Midwest. What is his best Valentine's Day memory?
JACK FELDMAN: "Any and all Valentine's when I actually had a girlfriend."
And the worst memory?
JACK FELDMAN: "All the other ones."
He remembers as a child choosing valentine cards to give to his classmates, a tradition for American schoolchildren.
JACK FELDMAN: "I always tried to get like the coolest ones, like the Pokeman ones and trying to give them out to everybody. I only wanted to give them to all the cute girls, but you had to give them to everybody back then."
STEVE EMBER:
Andrew Shim is twenty-two years old, from Maryland. We asked him what American teenagers like to do for Valentine's Day. He listed the usual -- chocolate, a movie, maybe go to a party. But then we asked him if he had ever done anything special.
ANDREW SHIM: "Oh yeah, I actually made my own chocolate at home. But I kind of messed it up. It was OK, I give to that person I like. It didn't turn out well, but you know, I mean it was a nice memory though, a good experience making chocolate."
Andrew Shim and Jack Feldman are doing college internship programs in Washington. So are these three international students we are about to meet, starting with Jeong Kim from Seoul.
JEONG KIM: "Normally in Korea, well the girls take the opportunity to give out chocolates to guys that they have a crush on."
KATTIA: "In Mexico we're used to like for, for more for couples, not like so for friends and stuff. It's a cool day because everybody gets to give balloons and chocolates and all that stuff to the person you're in a relationship in or whatever."
SONIA ZIADE: "In Canada it's pretty much the same as the U.S. It's very consumer based, where we buy chocolate. We go to the restaurant, have a romantic dinner. Every day should be Valentine's Day, right?"
Those last two voices were Kattia from Mexico and Sonia Ziade from Montreal, Canada.
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