Made in Macao | Post-holiday blues?

Jenny Lao-Phillips

After long Christmas and Chinese New Year holidays in the last two months, everything seems to be back to normal. Schools have started, most people are back to work, even traffic between 8a.m. and 9a.m. is back to its normal congestion. So what follows? We have a term called “looking like the fourth day of the New Year”.

In Macao and Hong Kong, the Spring Festival has always been the longest mandatory holiday in the year. The holiday runs from the afternoon of the New Year’s Eve to the third day of the Chinese New Year, as everyone living here would know. So, what does the fourth day of the year look like? The holidays are over, pockets are lighter from spending on entertainment or giving out lai see, but our weights have often increased due to over-eating – which is why the fourth day of the New Year usually doesn’t look good, and is probably the greyest work day of the year. Although some people may feel upset about having to go back to school or work, I believe people in Macao are mostly blessed with immunity from post-holiday blues. Why?

According to the many articles on post-holiday depression from the Huffington Post, Psychology Today and the BBC News, to name a few, some causes of post-holiday blues include missing one’s family after spending several days together, the feeling of loneliness after a busy holiday, dark and cold weather, missing the extra sleeping time, unmet expectations during the holidays and probably hangovers. So let’s see why these hardly affect us tough “Macaoians”.

Firstly, family gatherings are a big tradition in our culture, with the majority of people spending a couple days or more with their extended family during the holiday seasons – but we don’t normally miss them terribly after the holidays. This is because family gatherings are extremely regular activities in our culture. Plenty of families actually meet weekly or monthly. So, post- holiday depression caused by missing one’s family does not apply here.

Secondly, the feeling of loneliness. This seems to be quite the opposite here in Macao. While in most places, young professionals seldom have time to meet up with friends except during the holidays, Macao is small enough that regularly hanging out with friends is possible every day. We don’t have to wait for long holidays.  In fact, many shops and restaurants were closed during the holidays, so the complaints have been that there was nothing to do during the Spring Festival. Therefore, it is not surprising to hear quite a few people saying they are happy to be back to work; at least there are bars and restaurants open for happy hour after work to look forward to.

Another cause of post-holiday depression is the dark and cold months after the holiday season. It’s true that in plenty of places February is gray and cold and stormy. Having to get up and go to work in this weather does cause depression. However, we are blessed with  cool and sunny post-holiday weather in Macao. In fact, it always seems to be sunny after any holiday, thanks to the South China weather.

One thing that may cause a certain level of sadness or guilt is unmet holiday expectations. We may have planned to visit some old friends, or work out rigorously to lose those extra pounds, or maybe finish writing those poems or painting that picture – but then, by the last hour of our holiday, none of those goals have been accomplished. Perhaps these unmet goals could be the cause of the slight feeling of guilt from thinking that we have wasted a good holiday – but not many people seem to set ambitious targets during their long breaks.

Finally, as for missing time to sleep or feeling hungover from drinking too much during the holiday, well, most of us are probably used to that feeling whether it’s post-holiday or not. Thus, we are immune.