Hard Luggage and the Chinese Class Divide
It’s the little things that tell the world that you have money.
It’s travel season in China, and that means that the time is right to talk about another small, often overlooked yet potentially notable element of Chinese culture: Luggage.
Specifically, I’m talking about Samsonite knockoffs of the kind you can see above. These are incredibly common in China. This time of year, the malls are packed with luggage displays featuring dozens of suitcases just like these — and only like these, as other types of luggage are actually fairly rare. Hard suitcases are commonly given away as prizes and presented as gifts, especially to graduating students — a reminder, perhaps, that they are expected to return home on a regular basis.
So these hard suitcases are extremely common, and yet in a way I feel like they represent a small but very visible element of the class divide.
In every culture, there’s at least one thing that speaks to money — and the lack thereof — in a very true way. What I mean is that there are things that you automatically buy if you have money, to the point where anyone who doesn’t have these things is assumed to be poor. It almost doesn’t matter if you want them, you get them so that you don’t look broke.
In the United States, the big one here concerns dentistry. There might be nothing that speaks to poverty back home so much as bad dentition, especially missing teeth. If you lose a tooth for whatever reason, you have it replaced provided you have the money to do so. If you don’t have it replaced, it means you don’t have money — simple as that. This is not true everywhere, and indeed there are many countries (including affluent European states) where you will encounter rich people with rotten teeth because such things don’t speak to poverty there.
In China, one of these signs is hard luggage. In a Chinese train depot, all the people are either moving their belongings in hard luggage or in plastic sacks. Needless to say, the difference is stark.
Hard suitcases like the ones above cost between $25 and $75, depending on size, brand and where and when one buys them. Back home, that’s right reasonable — far cheaper than actual Samsonite luggage, certainly. Over here, though, a few hundred RMB can be quite a bite. Of course, it is just a one-time purchase — such items are meant to last a lifetime (or at least a few years — it is China, nothing lasts as long as you think it will), and over a lifetime that’s not too much.
So if you have that few hundred RMB, you buy the suitcase. You do it because you will be traveling — once a year minimum, more if you can — and no one wants to look poor in the train station.
As I sit here writing this, I find myself wondering if I shouldn’t get my own Samsonite copy. It’s not that I particularly need one — the bags I have are more than suitable, especially given that I don’t exactly jet around the country. Even so, the allure of the hard suitcase is tempting. It’s a respectable piece of merchandise as a very reasonable cost and it even has a bit of history to it.
Just something to consider — I’ll have no shortage of opportunities to buy one.
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