Chocolates, roses, champagne and sweet dumplings have been selling well; mobile-phone users have exchanged greetings and jokes by text message.

Valentine's Day last year fell on the third day of the lunar year but, this year, the annual tribute to romantic love came on the first Friday after the week-long Spring Festival holidays.

Meng Na, a 25-year-old woman in Beijing, said on Friday: "After we have been apart for a dozen days, Valentine's Day is so precious for me and my boyfriend to express our love and stay together without thinking I should get up at seven o'clock tomorrow morning for work.''

She said she and her friends nearly forgot the day last year as people were busy with lunar New Year celebrations, which start on the first day of the Chinese New Year and may last until the Lantern Festival on the 15th day.

At Beijing's Laitai Flower Market, the wholesale price of one rose was 4 yuan (48 cents) yesterday, double the normal price. A new rose called Blue Fairy Fox, imported from the Netherlands, was even sold at 80 yuan (US$9.70) to more than 300 yuan (US$36).

In Southwest China's Chongqing, since Monday, Air China has been flying in 2 tons of fresh flowers daily from Yunnan Province to meet the demand of the local market. Roses and lilies, both flowers carrying the message of love, account for more than 95 percent of the total.

Glutinous rice dumplings -- which symbolize reunions of people and good relations between them -- have also sold very well to welcome today's Lantern Festival.

More than 2,500 kilograms of dumplings have been sold at the Beijing store Blue Island Tower in the first five days of the week and better sales are expected Saturday, the Beijing Morning News reported.

"It is a win-win situation for retailers of food for Western and Chinese festivals,'' said retailer Hua Yingying.

But Valentine's Day means little to some middle-aged and elderly Chinese people. Guo Yuhua, a sociology professor at Beijing's Tsinghua University, said: "Unlike Chinese traditional festivals, which are born out of agricultural society, the Western occasions coincide with young people's pursuit of modern lives.''

Guo added traditional festivals are taking on new meanings as people's lives change.

In the lead-up to this year's Valentine's Day, many "Do It Yourself" (DIY) stores in Shenyang, Northeast China, were crowded with lovers who carefully chose beads engraved with different letters to create necklaces or bracelets, which featured their own individuality through joined letters spelling out a variety of holiday greetings.

Since beads in the stores are made of different materials and have different sizes, colors and shapes, customers have no end of choices to present unparalleled Valentine's Day gifts, which are believed to symbolize lovers' uniqueness to each other.

Meanwhile, hotels in China's major cities are bustling with preparations, including expensive banquets and special lovers' suites.

The most attention-getting event of the day is a kissing competition held in Changzhou in East China's Jiangsu Province, in which the couple who kisses the longest time wins a 10,000 Yuan (US$1,200) prize.

(China Daily February 15, 2003)