Young People Hiding Gifts for Strangers in China

From Sichuan to Shandong, growing numbers of people take part in 'city treasure hunting'

- Ang Qing

BEIJING - It was the evening before Christmas when a mysterious Santa Claus hid snow globes and a Christmas tree stuffed toy in Beijing's university district Haidian before uploading hints of their location online.

Within minutes, the festive trinkets were retrieved despite the winter chill, according to strangers who shared photos of their spoils with the blogger who had hidden them just half an hour earlier.

In China, hiding gifts around town has become a daily affair as "city treasure hunting" hots up on Instagram-like platform Xiaohongshu.

Hashtags with a city's name followed by xunbao - the Chinese term for treasure hunting - clue hobbyists in on where and what trinkets have been hidden by bloggers. By Dec 26, such hashtags had racked up more than 36 million views on Xiaohongshu.

From Sichuan to Shandong, a growing group of young Chinese are transforming their cities into playgrounds by leaving goodies such as handicrafts, milk tea packets and blind boxes around.

The trend joins a global treasure-hunting movement known as geocaching, where participants use Global Positioning System-enabled devices to search for containers concealed outdoors.

On Xiaohongshu, bloggers share videos and photos of the items they hide, along with instructions on where the public can retrieve them.

Several young Chinese told The Straits Times that these treasure hunts help spread joy amid the economic gloom in China, where growth remains sluggish despite the world's second-largest economy lifting Covid-19 restrictions at the end of 2022.