China: May Day in China used to be an occasion festooned with red flags, the air ringing with the Internationale as communists celebrated international labour. The workers keep the red flag flying in Beijing, but these days the comrades like a bit of shopping and relaxation alongside more doctrinaire May Day pursuits.
For one thing, the traditional celebration of international workers has been transformed into a "golden week", seven days of consumerism and leisure with state blessing.
"If all weekends and holidays are counted, workers can enjoy up to 114 days off...about a third of the year is spent in leisure timeif past trends hold true, they will likely spend more than 40 billion yuan (€4 billion)," the official Xinhua news agency reported.
It's a powerful sign of how China is being transformed. Until the mid-1990s, Chinese workers toiled six days a week and took off a long weekend every so often. These rare days off were spent doing housework or resting.
Then, in 1999, the government brought in the "golden weeks", extending May Day, Chinese New Year and Autumn Festival holidays, partly to give the retail sector a boost and partly in a spirit of allowing more leisure as a reward for all that hard work.
On a train to Beijing back from Hubei province, former government clerk Wang Baoxin tells of how he would spend his holidays tidying the apartment or just relaxing, but this May Day he took advantage of the full week to go to a wedding in his home town.
"I bought lots of gifts and some traditional Beijing snacks," said Mr Wang, who now runs a tennis court. Zhang Xioyan (28), a secretary in a software firm, has been taking full advantage of the "golden week".
"It's great to have a bit of time. I bought a lot of new sports gear to bring with me on my trip back to see my family. I like to buy near the holiday because you get a great discount," she said.
Chinese labour ministry figures show workers here put in an average 21 days a month and 2,009 hours a year, more or less in line with the figures in the West.
All this extra free time is translating into a boom time for many sectors. Last year the number of outbound tourists from China reached 31 million, the largest number in Asia.
Meanwhile, China's cinemas saw box office takings of €200 million, a rise of €4 million year-on-year. All fuelled by a rise in annual disposable income in the cities, which last year was just over €1,000, although it's in tellingly stark contrast to the poor countryside, where it was just €325.
Hong Kong retailers have been among the prime recipients of the open wallets from across the border. Immigration authorities expect more than six million people to cross the border during the May Day festival, a rise of 14 per cent on a year ago, many of them tourists taking advantage of relaxed rules to allow more mainlanders throng central Hong Kong's glittering malls or the bargain paradises of Kowloon, buying cosmetics, mobile phones or grabbing tickets to Disneyland on Lantau Island.
But not everything has changed, said tourism official Wei Xiao'an.
Leisure expenditure was quite unbalanced between rural and urban people, and many still preferred to spend their leisure time sleeping. Just like in the old days.