In China, red is the color of weddings. In South Africa, it's the color of mourning.
Both readings start from the same raw material: red is the color of blood and fire. What changes isn't the color or its origin — it's what a culture does with that association. One reads it as life and energy. The other, as blood spilled.
luck, celebration, protection
The reverence for red starts with dependence on fire and the sun: fire kept people warm and cooked their food, and both sunrise and sunset are red — from there it became a visual symbol of warmth and vitality. In five-element theory, red corresponds to fire, which represents the sun's energy and the drive that makes everything grow; in ancient cosmology it represents yang: life, warmth, energy. During the Zhou dynasty (1046–256 BCE), red was associated with the sun, with fire, and with Zhu Rong, the god of the south, and was believed to ward off evil spirits and draw in good fortune — it was seen as the peak of yang energy, able to scare off demons and protect newlyweds from bad luck.
The bride traditionally wears red (the qipao), embroidered with dragon and phoenix. Red envelopes (hongbao) with money take root in Lunar New Year celebrations from the Han dynasty (2nd century BCE), and were believed to ward off evil spirits too. Lanterns, cut paper, and cinnabar lacquer follow the same logic. It's banned from funerals: it's the color of happiness, and would be disrespectful there.
mourning and bloodshed — a recent political meaning, not ancient folklore
Red has been adopted as a mourning color in South African public life, tied to the memory of apartheid. It's documented in specific events: mourners filled a stadium in Durban dressed in red for the funeral of Senzo Meyiwa, captain and goalkeeper of the national football team; Archbishop Desmond Tutu wore red at Nelson Mandela's funeral in 2013.
Officially, the colors of the South African flag carry no assigned symbolism — that was a deliberate choice, given the country's cultural diversity and turbulent past. Unofficial, popular readings do exist, including that red stands for blood spilled in the country's struggles; the flag's own designer, Frederick Brownell, has stated that reading himself. It's a historical and political meaning — with eleven official languages in the country, not a single ethnic tradition.
danger, passion, power — the longest list of any color here
In the West, red carries the longest list of associations of any color here: warmth, love, passion, power, eroticism, political radicalism, excitement, boldness, the devil, danger, desire, anger. In Europe the dominant reading is narrower — mostly danger: traffic lights, stop signs, red figures in accounting. The contrast with China is total — where one culture sees fortune and protection, the West sees alarm.