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The ‘Underworld’ of the Red Envelope Industry

A lai see fantasy from AsianWeek’s resident gumshoe

By Ji Hyun Lim | AsianWeek Staff Writer

AsianWeek’s staff was all gathered around for the annual Chinese New Year issue brainstorming session. Pens in hand, notebooks on our laps, we belted out ideas left and right about possible angles for stories. It seemed to be an extremely difficult task to take a fresh angle on a tradition that hasn’t changed much. Even worse, AsianWeek has been doing this issue every year for the past 20 years or so and exhausted almost every possibility.

My editor suggested a different angle on the tradition of passing out lai see — the lucky red envelopes filled with money and traditionally passed out to children or unmarried people. I lit up. Hmmm, there could be an interesting little story here, I thought. I suggested that I explore the lai see industry. I figured I would talk to merchants, visit factories and discover exactly how these envelopes are made.

“Um, I am pretty sure they are just printed at a printing press like most stationary,” my editor interjected.

I wasn’t having it. I was sure there was more to this story, and I was going to break it. I rubbed my palms together and fantasized over the possibility of doing an informative, documentary-style piece on these envelopes. The photo possibilities were endless!

I did my Internet search on Google and found a few factories in Hong Kong. I typed in hong bao — another way to say lai see and learned that it can mean a Chinese envelope, a Singaporean tea or an Asian man who had received a medical degree from Nanjing Medical College.

Like a good reporter, I explored other resources, like an antiquated phone book that has been in the office since the 1980s. I looked under “envelopes” and decided to give a few places a call. I even visited a local print shop in Chinatown. The owners spoke very little English and after over-enunciating, “I am doing a story on lai see. St-o-o-o-o-r-r-y. Story on lai see. [Here I mime being a reporter and writing a story],” for about five minutes I decided that this wasn’t going to be my in.

Finally, a woman who worked at a stationery store gave me a lead and I called a printing press on the Peninsula. I scheduled an appointment to visit on Sunday with my digital camera, Cantonese translator and of course, my pen and pad in hand.

Sunday rolled around and I was so excited to visit an actual production location of lai see envelopes. I could smell the story in the air. My friend picked me up at 12:45 sharp and we drove 25 miles to San Mateo. My translator and I bravely entered a small, innocuous stationery store huddled on a little corner of San Mateo’s main street.

A middle-aged woman with an impaired eye hesitantly asked us what we wanted in Chinese. She allowed us to take pictures of the envelopes but would not disclose anything about how the lai see envelopes were produced or distributed. She did not want to provide numbers of her lai see contacts for fear that it might jeopardize her business.

Hmmmm, she must have something to hide. Could the lai see industry be a huge front for some kind of illegal activity, I thought? Were they smuggling secret codes on the insides on the envelopes? Running drugs? Was it something even more global?

The woman actually picked up on my suspicion. She must be a professional. My cover of wanting to do an innocuous story on how lai see was printed was too transparent. My translator explained to me that she thought we were writing an investigative piece on the lai see industry and she did not want to participate. We received short, curt answers and were showed to the door. Drats! Foiled again! Will I ever know the secrets of lai see?

Spirits low, the translator and I took a quick trip to get a boba drink to cheer us up and drove back to San Francisco.

The deadline for the article was looming. I had collected two dozen photographs of different kinds of lai see envelopes, including ones with the zodiac, cartoon characters and traditional Chinese writing but still had no meaty details on the lai see industry.

Now desperate, I asked the local pharmacist — who sold lai see envelopes — if he could provide a mere quote about what it is like to sell the envelopes. Is there a mad rush around this time? Does he stock up months in advance? No comment. He must be in on the lai see conspiracy. He suggested I visit the local stationery store down on Grant Street in Chinatown and I trudged there like a trooper, hoping to get some important facts.

A middle-aged man with missing front teeth was in the middle of eating lunch when I interrupted him. He told me with finality that lai see envelopes come from Hong Kong and that red was the color for good luck. That’s all he knew about it. Sure.

I thought about the crisp dollars that are placed in these envelopes and finally resolved to visit the local Bank of America in Chinatown to ask if many customers asked for crisp dollars. Pretty pathetic, huh? A slender older bank teller affirmed that many people ask for crisp dollars but refused to give me any further details.

I have been bested by the lai see mafia this time around, but I won’t let it go. I might just have to travel to China with my translator to break the story. Look out lai see, I will know your secrets and bring them into the light, if it’s the last thing I ever do!