Yesterday, the General Office of the State Council issued a notice on the holiday arrangements for some festivals in 2013, making public the specific holiday schedules for New Year’s Day, Spring Festival, Qingming Festival, Labor Day, Dragon Boat Festival, Mid-Autumn Festival, and National Day next year.
Once the holiday schedule was released, it drew complaints from netizens, especially regarding the New Year’s Day arrangement — it wasn’t the previously speculated three-day break from December 30, 2012 (Sunday), December 31 (Monday), and January 1, 2013 (Tuesday), but rather from January 1 to 3. This resulted in a fragmented mix of work and rest starting from December 29: December 29 and 30 were regular weekend days off, December 31 was a workday, January 1 to 3, 2013 were days off, and then January 4 to 11 required working eight consecutive days. Why is next year’s New Year’s Day schedule so unusual, given the annual “calendar shuffle”? Perhaps it has something to do with the fixed total number of statutory holidays each year.
Can’t next year’s holidays borrow from this year’s “leftovers”?
With New Year’s Day 2013 less than a month away, many people have started making travel plans. Before the official holiday schedule for next year was released, everyone speculated on the most likely arrangement: “January 1 is a Tuesday, close to the previous weekend; taking December 30, 31, and January 1 off would cause the least disruption, so that’s probably how it will be.” Many made their leave plans accordingly. But in the newly released “Notice on Holiday Arrangements for Some Festivals in 2013,” it clearly stated that the New Year’s Day holiday would be from January 1 to 3, a break from Tuesday to Thursday, with the two weekend days (January 5 and 6) moved to compensate for the lost weekend. In other words, December 29 and 30, 2012 would be normal days off, December 31 would be a workday, then three days off for New Year’s Day, followed by eight consecutive workdays starting January 4.
“Why work on December 31, which is neither here nor there?” “Couldn’t we just swap one day from the previous weekend? Why make it eight consecutive workdays!” The New Year’s Day holiday arrangement became the primary target of netizen complaints. Those who had signed travel contracts early based on the ideal leave schedule of “December 30, 31, and January 1” were especially vocal about being “duped.” Some even called on companies to simply give employees January 31 off, allowing for a six-day “long holiday.”
Generally, statutory holiday adjustments follow the principle of “minimal disruption and avoiding long consecutive workdays before or after the holiday,” but why the hassle with next year’s New Year’s Day? One relatively reasonable explanation has been proposed: the New Year’s Day holiday spans the year, and if it were arranged as the netizens hoped — “December 30, 31, and January 1” — then two of the New Year’s Day holidays in 2013 would actually fall in 2012, causing inconvenience in annual holiday statistics. Therefore, the decision was made to “adjust the later days, not the earlier ones.”
It’s also worth noting that January 5 and 6 were originally weekend days off, and also the days of the postgraduate entrance exam. Now these two days have become workdays, adding a bit of extra stress for those preparing for the exams.
Medium- to long-haul New Year’s Day tours may benefit
Yesterday, travel agencies were busy adjusting their short-haul New Year’s Day plans and adding more medium- to long-haul tour options. “The previously planned holiday dates were December 30, 31, and January 1, but now they all need to be adjusted. But this change is actually good news for travel agencies, because tourists only need to take one day of leave to get a six-day holiday, which should stimulate interest in medium- to long-haul tours,” said Shen Min, assistant general manager of Shanghai Travel Agency. In the past, the number of people traveling during New Year’s Day wasn’t high, and most opted for 2-3 day short trips. With this adjustment, medium- to long-haul options such as Tengchong hot springs and Changbai Mountain skiing may see increased interest.
In addition, affected by the holiday schedule, airlines may adjust ticket prices for flights departing on January 1 and 2.
[“Leave-Patching” Strategy]
12 days of annual leave can be patched together into seven “golden weeks”
12 days of annual leave can be patched together into seven “golden weeks”
After the release of next year’s holiday schedule, some netizens used their ingenuity to “patch together” seven “golden weeks.” For example, the Mid-Autumn Festival is scheduled for a holiday from September 19 to 21. But September 14 and 15 are weekend days, and if you take three days off from September 16 to 18, you can get an eight-day break, creating a “golden week.” By strategically combining other holidays, as long as you have enough annual leave — for example, 12 days — you can patch together three seven-day holidays for New Year’s Day, Labor Day, and Dragon Boat Festival, plus two eight-day holidays for Qingming and Mid-Autumn, along with the original golden weeks of Spring Festival and National Day, totaling seven long holidays. That would be the perfect scenario.
If you have five days of annual leave, taking three days during the Qingming Festival allows for an eight-day break: take three annual leave days from April 1 to 3 (Monday to Wednesday), and combine them with the weekend and Qingming holiday to get a holiday from March 30 to April 6. Take two days off during the Dragon Boat Festival, and you can get a seven-day break: take annual leave on June 13 and 14 (Thursday and Friday), and combine them with the weekend and Dragon Boat Festival to get a holiday from June 10 to 16. If you’re willing to use up all your annual leave at once, you can take five days off from February 4 to 8 (Monday to Friday), resulting in an ultra-long 14-day holiday from February 2 to 15.
If you have 10 days of annual leave, you have even more flexibility for “leave-patching.” For example, taking seven annual leave days from February 16 (the seventh day of the Lunar New Year) to February 22 (the thirteenth day), combined with the seven-day Spring Festival holiday from February 9 to 15, gives you an ultra-long holiday from February 9 to 24, letting you rest from New Year’s Eve to the Lantern Festival and spend quality time with family.