Growing Green Bananas for Stress Relief
Also Used as a Social Tool to Improve Office Atmosphere
The number of Chinese office workers ripening green bananas in their workplaces is increasing. It is understood that they are growing green bananas as a way to relieve stress.
On the 13th, Hong Kong's Sing Tao Daily reported that posting photos of a bunch of unripe bananas placed in a water bottle with a tag saying "Banana Green Prohibited (禁止蕉綠)" is spreading like a trend on Chinese social networking services (SNS). This means asking people not to touch the bananas for about a week until they turn yellow and become edible.
Chinese white-collar workers relieve work stress by watching bananas ripen to yellow. Bananas are also used as a kind of social tool to improve relationships with colleagues and enhance the office atmosphere. Additionally, in Chinese, "banana green" sounds the same as the word for "worry (焦慮)," so it also means "no worries."
In fact, it is not difficult to see photos on Chinese SNS where each banana has a name tag attached. This is to decide in advance who will eat the banana once it is fully ripe. Following this trend, green bananas have become popular products in online shopping malls. Daily orders reach 10,000, and sales amount to about 40 tons.
Regarding green bananas, various reactions have appeared on SNS such as "Really fun," "Mine has been green for over two weeks," "When will my banana ripen?" and "It's fun just to watch quietly."
Meanwhile, recently, it has been reported that the variety of fruits grown in offices is diversifying to include not only bananas but also pineapples, spinach, tomatoes, and pumpkins.
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