Pineapple Day: How I Started a Global Holiday(startupandrew.com) |
Pineapple Day: How I Started a Global Holiday(startupandrew.com) |
It's funny how little things can snowball.
Thanks for the love HN! Don't forget to set that calendar reminder for yourself for next June 27th! (and set to repeat annually, of course)!
I am also a pineapple fan, I like that chemical fresh pineapple has to remove the lining from your mouth. No other food items have it and, for that reason, pineapple is up there with olives, the hemp plant and the banana in 'proving' that god was a creative fellow.
However, there is a slight problem with the current National Pineapple Day. It happens during the off-season. Pineapples take two years to grow and you get just the one rather than a tree full of the things. So I would like to suggest that Pineapple Day be on a different date to celebrate the growing season.
In Europe we generally get Costa Rica pineapples, I understand that the Philippines and Thailand supply the U.S. and other markets, with different breeds of pineapple. Late June is not where the pineapple picking action is at, the ones we get in the stores at that time of year were picked green and ripened 'banana style' by ethylene.
People in warm parts of the world can grow their own pineapples, this isn't going to happen in Norway but what if in sunnier climes you had a pineapple growing competition in a Firebase sized workplace? It would take two years of dedication to be in with a chance of winning. Some people don't stick around in a job for that long. But pineapple plants in a competition could make an interesting addition to a workplace. This would also build on the history of the pineapple, which once was a status symbol.
The day is sufficiently trivial enough for people to want to celebrate it. National New Hampshire Day is never going to be celebrated in Norway. But pineapple day? Why not?
I also don't see a website for the day. This is important, pineapple awareness is needed.
So my suggestion is to hook up with people in Costa Rica and to reposition the day to a time that suits the growing season. Get people growing their own as a team building thing, furthermore, advance the cause of the pineapple as a workplace treat that is far better than chocolate, cake and other fattening nonsense.
The repositioning of the day to something seasonal is in itself a publicity garnering thing. It gives an excuse to write to people and get them to support the cause.
We do need to fix a few things by agreement and consensus at a global level so if we can all agree on a change to a national pineapple day then who knows, we could put the nuclear weapons away too.
The national pineapple day could also be used to revive using pineapple as a textile. Clearly 'pineapple silk' lost out to actual silk and other fibres but, in an age when washing 20,000 plastic fibres from a hoodie into the ocean is no longer cool, why not use the pineapple day to revive the lost art of making fancy outfits from pineapple silk?
How do you feel about providing free marketing for Big Pineapple (Dole)?
Niles: Happy Frasier Crane Day. Or is it Merry Frasier Crane Day,
I can never remember.
Frasier: Very amusing.
[...]
Frasier: Oh, up late last night?
Niles: Oh, I'm afraid so, as usual I left it till the last minute
to write all my Frasier Crane Day cards!I love this bit of the article.
"I can afford groceries" + snark = accidentally founding a new holiday
https://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?stor...
Or, just declare your day to be whatever you want. Nobody is checking and I don't think anybody cares.
In some ways isn't this how cults get started? Someone picks some arbitrary and weird thing that "initiates" an individual into an exclusive club. Then you get that first follower and you're off to the races.
Personally, I'm excited for the cult of the pineapple. It's my favorite fruit.
https://blogs.nicholas.duke.edu/exploring-green/the-sour-sid...
- US BigCorp (Dole mostly) starts throwing around cash to extremely poor and vulnerable populations (specifically Nicaraguan immigrants and traditional farmers in Costa Rica, where most pineapples consumed in US/EU come from); farmers get wide eyed and accept
- farmers cooperatives lose members and land, meaning value adds for things previously e.g. insurance for crop failures become unaffordable; cooperatives wane in power and shrivel up
- vicious cycle ensues: opportunities dwindle unless you're willing to be poisoned, exploited etc. at the local Dole plantation. or grow near/in Nicaragua where your stuff just gets confiscated on the way back in.
it's regrettable that my post was interpreted in the light of negative nancy style, everything is bad so no big deal, or what have you.
the increased demand for pineapples - again, consumed almost exclusively outside of Costa Rica - has had demonstrable negative impacts on Costa Rican farmers, its environment, and so forth. and, as you might have guessed, a principally US corporation makes most of the profits.