Chinese People Taking Their Pet Cabbages For A Walk

China celebrates labor day every year on May 1. The holiday is commonly known as the May Day holiday and it spans a total of roughly 3 days (4 if you’re lucky). During the holiday, millions travel across the country and various activities are held. It’s generally an all around good time.

During this year’s festival, a series of young people too hip for the rest of society were spotted dragging heads of cabbage on leashes. The whole thing was an art project by Chinese artist Han Bing! Han has been walking cabbages across the world for the last 14 years!

h/t: kotaku

One man explains the reason as such: “A quintessentially Chinese symbol of sustenance and comfort for poor Chinese turned upside down. If a full stock of cabbage for the winter was once a symbol of material well-being in China, nowadays the nouveau riche have cast aside the modest (monotonous) cabbage in favor of ostentatious gluttony in fancy restaurants where waste signifies status… Yet, for the poor and struggling, the realities of cabbage as a subsistence bottom line have not changed—what’s changed is the value structure that dictates what—and who—is valuable or worthless in Chinese society.”