I’m convinced that everything unpleasant about Chinese New Year begins and ends with the hong bao.

The hong bao, directly translated into ‘red packet’, is a Chinese tradition where people give out little bundles of money wrapped in red uh, packets because the Chinese are genetically incapable of going the extra mile to say, get a gift, preferring to let money do the talking instead.

However, the hong bao is one of those Chinese traditions stuck in a time warp of societal circumstances. Typically given by those who are married to those who are not, this was completely understandable in an era of compulsory matchmaking, ensuring that the recipients of the hong bao would always be younger than the giver, and the gift of the money would be a nice token to someone still dependent on their parents.

Fast forward to today, where the average age of marriage has gone up from 15 to about 30. And some choose not to get married, either. The tradition still being carried on means that sometimes younger people give hong baos to older people—an awkward social situation at best. At worst, it becomes leverage for random relatives to rain a couple of guilt drops on you as they present you with a gift—what ought to be a pleasant exchange.

“I’m looking forward to not having to give you these anymore,” they say, broadly insinuating that they want you to get married, but with a nice slap on wrist, informing you that you are an unworthy recipient of their money.

“Oooh, when are you going to start giving some of these away to my [insert child's name A] and [insert child's name B]?” they say, again with the same insinuation but with the added shamefaced request that you ‘return the favour’ at some point.

How very ironic for an otherwise simple gesture symbolising good luck to be, in essence, a right royal pain in the arse.