Birthday Cakes from China

Birthday cake was introduced to China in the late Qing Dynasty around the early 20th century. As a symbol of Western culture and commodity economy, its popularity is closely related to the political climate of the modern and contemporary era. Inspired by food anthropology, this essayistic archive film investigates the spread and localization of birthday cakes and their associated rituals in modern China and Chinese communities worldwide. It also examines the critical influence of birthday party services provided by KFC and McDonald's, which entered China after the economic reforms of the 1980s. The investigation covers newspaper, news, films, family archives and Chinese-style cake decoration tutorial.