介绍:
Xiaohua: Recent news shows that the Chinese government is encouraging employees to have two-and-half-day weekend during the hot summer days.
Wu Wenxue, Deputy Director of the National Tourism Bureau said this during a State Council meeting.
Now, this encouragement comes with the understanding that the weekend will start on Friday afternoon.
In an ongoing survey conducted by sina, nearly 80 percent of the estimated 30,000 respondents believe a two-and-half day long weekend is feasible.
“未来将鼓励有条件的地方和单位，可根据实际情况，在夏季灵活安排工作时间，使职工周五下午与周末时间相结合，实现小短假。”在最近召开的国务院政策例行吹风会上，国家旅游局副局长吴文学透露，化解带薪休假难题或将有新的解决方案。
So this is the solution that this guy has given out, but why is this proposal being raised do you think?
Heyang: First of all, I think it’s a bit strange that it’s the deputy director of the national tourism bureau making this statement, and it’s not the state council. So, I think it makes sense for the tourism bureau to want people to have a bit more free time so maybe they can go travel or something like that. But, this is actually a solution that this government official has found to solve the problem of people not having paid annual leaves, I think, which is very innovative to the extent that I think its kind of farfetched.
Mark: But, there seems to be a link with “hot summer days.” What is the connection with hot weather?
Xiaohua: I don’t know. Maybe it’s that the summer holiday is usually the travel season, and that’s why this tourism official is saying this. However, I have to point out that this is not a rule that is going to be made national or something. He is only suggesting that companies or organizations, who can afford to do so, can give their employees a half day during Friday.
Mark: What is this man’s name? I need to go and see him.
Xiaohua: Wu Wenxue
Mark: Wu Wenxue. I must go and see him, and you know what I’ll say to him?
Xiaohua: What?
Mark: Because we’ve been proposing this either on this program or on other shows on this radio station for years, my idea is that two of our weekends every month are three day weekends and our other weekend is just one day.
Xiaohua: I remembered it.
Mark: So therefore, sometimes we only get Saturday off, and then the next week we only get Saturday off, but then we get Friday, Saturday, Sunday off for the remaining two weeks of the month every month. It ties in with travel because in China, a vast country, you have a limited range of where you can go in two days—Saturday and Sunday—and as a visitor to your country I want to see as much of it as possible, but I’m restricted by having a two day weekend. In a three day weekend, that makes all the difference. I think having that free day in the middle where you don’t have to travel either there or back would make a massive difference. So I’d be all for my own idea not surprisingly of having two three day weekends a month and two one day weekends a month.
Heyang: I think your very individualistic take on this issue is admirable, but I think for the authorities to try to manage the country with masses of people, there could be some obstacles when the weekends shift so swiftly so to speak.
Mark: Well I don’t know. The one thing is it wouldn’t cost the employees any money because we’d actually get the same net number of days off per month as we do already. This man’s idea costs the employees money, mine doesn’t.
Heyang: But what about the paid holidays that’s been promised to people—the paid annual leaves.
Mark: I don’t think that this has got anything with this idea where does that come into it?
Heyang: Because that extra Friday evening that you’re supposedly going to get comes from your annual holiday.
Mark: What?
Heyang: Yeah, this is what this is about.
Mark: What? So, it’s not sort of like an extra half a day off?
Heyang: That extra Friday afternoon weekend you get comes with a price.
Mark: Well that’s terrible, I mean that’s even worse. It’s like a death of a thousand cuts of your annual holiday bit by bit every week, and then you’ll end up with no annual holiday.
Xiaohua: But this person is not saying “employees, you have to take that half day off.” They are only saying that you can, if your employers say yes, take half a day off on Friday.
Mark: Well, I don’t like the sound of that.
Heyang: And I love the analogy that, Mark, you just made, and the only people who would agree to this is those who realize that they will never be allowed to have those annual paid holidays in a lump sum time. So I think it’s only those who are already in that disadvantaged situation that don’t have these annual paid leaves given to them will agree to this.
Mark: Well, it won’t apply to them then if they’ve got no free time to have gradually taken away from them half a day by half a day. They’ll probably be exempt anyway, won’t they?
Heyang: Yeah, I supposed so. So anyway, that sort of is the closing remark on this topic as we arrive to, that is it might not work—it probably won’t work.
