Originally Posted by Budhisten

Well it's a tradition here. In the olden days when pepper was one of the most important trade goods, usually single men above 30 was given the task of watching it - since they wouldn't be distracted by their wives... When time moved on, it became tradition to gift somebody turning 30 with pepper if they weren't married yet...

I guess the youth got a bit impatient and started doing the same thing, five years earlier with cinamon (Which by the way is MUCH worse than pepper)