"Worth Coming to Work Early"...Winning a Vacation Right After the Holiday?

Winning a Paid Vacation Ticket on the First Day Back After the Holiday...

A Stroke of Luck for an Employee in Her 20s

Goes Viral Online... Netizens Say, "More Envious Than Cash"

A story about an employee of a Chinese food company winning a "10-day paid vacation ticket" in a prize draw on the first day back at work after the Lunar New Year (Spring Festival) holiday has gone viral online.

On March 2, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported that a video of a New Year's prize draw event held at a food company in Hunan Province, China, has garnered high view counts and numerous 'likes' on social networking services (SNS).

The event was held on the first day employees returned to work after a nine-day Spring Festival holiday. Zhang Zilong, the company's SNS department manager, set up a lottery box at the office entrance for returning employees.

The lucky winner was a woman in her 20s surnamed Tao, who was the first to arrive at work that day and participated in the draw. She won the grand prize: the "10-day paid vacation ticket."

A promotional banner targeting Chinese tourists is displayed on Myeongdong Street in Jung-gu, Seoul ahead of China’s biggest holiday, the Lunar New Year. Photo by Yonhap News Agency

Immediately after her win, Tao shared a screenshot of booking a train ticket back to her hometown, expressing her happiness by saying, "It was worth coming to work early." She added that she would use her extra vacation days to spend the holidays with her family once again.

In addition to the paid vacation ticket, the event offered a variety of prizes, including cash ranging from 10 yuan to 1,000 yuan, 1 gram of pure gold, and tablet PCs. However, local netizens expressed envy for the 10-day paid vacation, with comments such as "I envy the vacation more than the cash" and "Is that company hiring?"

Chinese companies often host bonus or prize events after the Spring Festival holiday each year to boost employee morale. Previously, a 3D printer company in Shenzhen attracted attention by offering a 100-gram gold bar as a prize.

This year, the Spring Festival fell on February 17, and the official holiday lasted for nine days, from February 15 to 23.

On February 23, China's Ministry of Transport announced that as of February 21, the 20th day of the Spring Festival travel rush period known as "Chunyun," a total of 5.08 billion interregional trips had been made. By mode of transport, road travel accounted for the majority with 4.76 billion trips, followed by rail (258 million), air (47.52 million), and waterway (19.99 million).

In particular, on February 20 alone, 352.999 million interregional trips were recorded, marking an all-time high and a 12.3% increase compared to the same day during last year's Chunyun.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.