Silver Week
Well, another modified White Day come and gone. This year, I happened to have five giri choco to give. I was looking for white chocolate at the mall, and I happened to run across a store, "inside scoop," that sold it by the pound. (Judging by the price, my total purchase was a bit more than that.) The clerk didn't offer to wrap it, so I was my usual slothful self and just crudely covered each serving with printer paper and a strip of Scotch tape. It seems that ladies always say they're really happy about gifts, so I don't have a lot by which to judge the reactions.
Mother again asked what the hell White Day was this year, so I decided to check Wikipedia to see what she might be able to find on her own. (Mother reads very little Japanese.) Unfortunately, the article makes it sound like a man gives ×3 gifts to everyone who gave him choco, which is not consistent with my knowledge of the tradition. Perhaps this is because it's not the same in all the countries, or perhaps English speakers don't know what they're talking about. In the real article, all I could find was the last sentence in the fourth paragraph under rekishi. Of course, in my post two years ago, I found that arifyn, the only person I know who might know about such a thing, hadn't heard about my version either. And he didn't answer my question.
Meanwhile, I looked more carefully at the yurai section. You can see my original rationale for celebrating White Day at the bottom here, but it turns out that I really read it wrong. It wasn't a counteraction of the ban on marriage on Valentine's. Valentine set up his own day to allow soldiers to marry against the ban, and White Day was essentially an anniversary where the couples renewed their vows. Stupid religion. Another holiday out the window.
Of course, in my research, I did happen to come across a new holiday, which is more of the "anti-religious" one I was seeking. Unfortunately, all of my friends in town are married. And it isn't a gift-giving holiday, so that doesn't make up for the loss of White Day.
I was also surprised to find that White Day was immediately followed by the Ides of March, which was almost immediately followed by St. Patty's (another bloody alcoholic Catholic-good thing I don't have any green clothes and am a teetotaler). Also, I had forgotten about the fact that 03.14 is also Pi Day. Whatever.