但是中国人也没有忘记这个节日的真正含义：厌倦单身。光棍节正是中国人承认自己对单身状态的厌倦，试着寻觅到另一半的日子。在11月7日光棍节前4天，微博（中国版的推特）上最热门的话题就是“为你的室友找到另一半”。超过20万人参与了讨论，上传自己室友的照片（有时就是自己的照片），希望能在光棍节前结束单身。
chinese are no strangers to loneliness: there are tens of millions of men in china who may never find love due to the country's massive gender imbalance, a result of the one child policy and a longstanding preference for male children. chinese women don't have it easy either: those who remain unmarried at the ripe old age of 27 risk being labeled "leftover women".
孤单对于中国人来说并不陌生：由于中国长期实行计划生育政策，以及长久以来重男轻女的子女偏好，中国的性别比例严重失衡，有数以百万的中国男子也许一辈子都不会找到伴侣。中国女性的情况也不容乐观：那些在27岁的“熟女”年龄之后还未婚的女性会被贴上“剩女”的标签。
although poverty and singledom are often linked outcomes in china, at least one web user was sure of which was worse. "spending singles' day alone isn't that scary," he wrote. "what's scary is when you're so poor you can't even enjoy taobao's ‘double 11.'" retail therapy indeed.
虽然在中国“贫穷”和“单身”往往是相互联系的，但网民们知道前者比后者更糟糕。如一位中国网民所说的，“一个人过光棍节并不可怕，可怕的是你没钱去参加淘宝的‘双11’庆典。”
in the united states， the lonely have reddit and cats. in china， they have singles' day， which falls on nov. 11 -- 11.11， the four ones symbolizing "bare branches，" chinese slang for bachelors. thought to have originated about 20 years ago as a joke on college campuses， singles' day was once an occasion for confessing one's feelings to that special someone. but since 2010， online retailers have transformed the holiday， also known as "double 11，" into an epic online shopping extravaganza akin to america's cyber monday.
在美国，孤单的人有红迪网和猫。在中国，孤单的人有光棍节。光棍节在每年11月11日，即11.11象征着“光棍”，汉语中给单身人士的诨名。光棍节大约20年前兴起自中国大学校园，学生们借这个日子打趣，在这一天向自己心仪的对象表白。但是2010年之后，又称“双11”的光棍节，被网络零售商转变成了和美国的“网购礼拜一”相似的网购狂欢庆典。
china has 271 million online consumers， meaning that almost half of china's 591 million internet users buy products online. e-commerce sites taobao and tmall， which saw a combined $$1 trillion in sales in 2012， will both be running promotional campaigns during china's singles' day. among the offers： 50 percent discounts on products like boyfriend body pillows and hoodies that read "i am single because i am fat." amazon。cndeclared that the site would sell "20，000 products discounted by as much as 90 percent." that includes a wedding ring， which singles can presumably buy， just in case.
