There are some things that you won't be aware of before you come to Korea, no matter how studied you believe yourself to be. Things like a Korea-only holiday that has distinctive paralells to an American-invented holiday. Over the past week I noticed a number of posters up around campus promoting something called 'Peppero Day'. Until yesterday I had no idea what Peppero Day even was, other than likely a sales campaign by the manufacturer of Peppero. Today I'll talk in breif about what I found out about this day.

A store dispay for Peppero Day.

First of all you may be wondering what Peppero is. Contrary to what the name might suggest, it doesn't contain any pepper. In fact it's virtually identical to the Japanese snack Pocky - both are cracker sticks covered in chocolate, sometimes with nuts or other additional toppings. Both are also fairly inexpensive in their normal forms, and come in a wide variety of flavors. Most commonly I've seen the regular chocolate and almond chocolate Peppero in stores around the school.

Now that we know what Peppero is, what is Peppero Day? After talking to students here I think I have something of an answer to that inquiry. Peppero Day is supposed to be a semi-romantic day where the snack is given to a significant other or a crush, or even just to friends. Displays were even put up on campus and just across the street from the back gate, with tons of different sizes and flavors of the snack food. There's a lot of promotion, and November 11 was likely chosen because the number 1 resembles a stick of Peppero in shape. Hence 11/11 looks like four sticks; 11/11/11 just ramps it up even more.

So that's the intention, but do people really celebrate the 'holiday'? It seems to be a mixed bag. A lot of younger people - presumably the target audience - don't seem to care too much, and some feel that it's just something Lotte came up with to try and sell more Peppero. To these the day has no significant romantic meaning. Others do purchase the snack and give it to someone special, though it's more likely that they'll share it with friends as well.

Finally, it seems to be very similar to America's Valentine's Day. Case in point: both are 'romantic' days invented by companies standing to sell more product due to the constructed meaning of said day. Peppero Day is just a little more obvious about it. Obviously there's a St. Valentine's Day, but any religious meaning has long since been replaced by the day of love that is now associated with February 14. So there's something I didn't know about Korea: it may be Veterans' Day in America, but it's Peppero Day in Korea!

An ad for Peppero Day sales.