Chinese Still Eating the Salt from Last Year’s Panic-Buying

In the wake of the 3/11 Japanese earthquake disaster last year, rumors regarding the contamination of sea salt from the radiation leak at Fukushima along with the fact that iodine may prevent the effects of radiation led to mass panic buying of salt across Eastern China. Many people lined up at supermarkets to buy up boxes of salt but when the panic died down, many people were left with large amounts of salt in their homes. One year later, Chinese netizens are asking each other if they’ve finished eating all that salt.

Comments from Douban:

龙四:

My family has been eating [salt] from our aunt’s family, who bought the salt a year ago.

站住,放开阿姨!:

After you finished, high-blood pressure is probably not far away.

大狸猫努力中！:

My dad’s coworker’s dad bought up 20 tons (the total number I don’t remember but it was a lot) to sell, but it didn’t happen…

憨憨:

Ask me next year, I definitely can’t finish it all this year.

欧巴桑軟面面:

Now salt prices have gone up, last year it was 1 RMB per bag, now it is 1.50 RMB per bag.

随喜:

Yesterday while cleaning up, my mom gave half a box of salt to my aunt’s family, and saved the other half, which was from last year.

西门大叔:

One year anniversary of the earthquake…in the future we can use the amount of salt we have in our homes as a symbol to remind ourselves of the Japanese earthquake.

kimi:

Neighbors bought a box and gave our family 10 bags. From last year to now, it can still last us another 6 months.

桃妖:

This…hahaha, only Chinese people panic buy when something happens.

我是男人:

Might as well use it for salt baths, haha.

Have you ever engaged in panic-buying? Did it turn out to be a wise move? If it wasn’t, would you admit it now?