"...a well-chosen gift gives pleasure and leaves you with a feeling of warmth and goodwill towards the donor. In contrast, if you select the gift hastily and mindlessly, you risk displeasing and perhaps even offending the recipient."
"There's no simple formula to guide you to the perfect gift. The best choices depend on knowing the recipient well: the person's tastes, needs and dreams. If you're at your wits' end, research the problem by interviewing a spouse, a close friend or colleague."
"In most circumstances, money can be a suitable gift."
I chatted with two of my friends to find out their views about this.
Neha Khanna, a 22 year old MBA student from London says, "A gift makes a difference. It's a way of acknowledging people. It tells them that you think about their needs." So does she get excited at the prospect of receiving receiving one herself? "Personally, accepting a gift is no longer a desire. It doesn't make a difference."
I however, love receiving gifts. A birthday without them is devastatingly boring and an ordinary day with them is enormously special. I personally can never forget the day a dear friend presented me with a nail polish. It was a shade that I loved and had a particularly hard time finding. The gift was out of the blue and totally unexpected, but it showed just how much my friend valued me.
Sukhmani Kochar, a final year graduate student from Delhi University, aptly explains how the price of the gift (generally!) doesn't matter, "I have never asked for gifts from anyone, be it parents, siblings or friends, but my last birthday was special as I had all my friends around me. The bouquet of flowers that they sent at midnight was really touching. The best part was a scrapbook that they made and gifted me." She further adds, "It does not matter whether the gift is expensive, but yes, if I find someone special, I'll demand a luxurious gift from him!" Sigh! The prospect of getting something luxurious sounds very tempting!
However, we have all had our share of "bad" gifts. When my family and I moved into our new house, we were presented with quite a lot of stuff from near and dear ones. Among the usual set of glasses and wall hangings, we received a bed sheet set complete with two pillow cases. Now there's nothing wrong with gifting bed sheets, but when those sheets are bright pink in colour with gigantic lime green cabbages, you know there's something wrong!
That's the reason why I love the concept of giving cash (I am not a fan of gift certificates!). This especially holds true for little children on their birthdays. When I was little, I would always end up with three or four boxes of plastic makeup, which was a rage back then. My brother would be showered with truckloads of "Picnic", a much loved board game. Such "popular" gifts always took the fun out of gift opening sessions! The same holds true for brides and grooms on their weddings. Imagine the plight of the poor couple as they contemplate the future of their nth juicer-mixer-grinder!
So the next time you buy a gift, think twice. Choose something that the receiver will cherish. There are better things out there than deodorants and show pieces!
What was the crappiest gift you ever received? (My boyfriend says that no matter what the gift is, you must never criticize it. Well I can't help it!)
Neha Khanna, a 22 year old MBA student from London says, "A gift makes a difference. It's a way of acknowledging people. It tells them that you think about their needs." So does she get excited at the prospect of receiving receiving one herself? "Personally, accepting a gift is no longer a desire. It doesn't make a difference."
I however, love receiving gifts. A birthday without them is devastatingly boring and an ordinary day with them is enormously special. I personally can never forget the day a dear friend presented me with a nail polish. It was a shade that I loved and had a particularly hard time finding. The gift was out of the blue and totally unexpected, but it showed just how much my friend valued me.
Image via icanhascheezburger
Sukhmani Kochar, a final year graduate student from Delhi University, aptly explains how the price of the gift (generally!) doesn't matter, "I have never asked for gifts from anyone, be it parents, siblings or friends, but my last birthday was special as I had all my friends around me. The bouquet of flowers that they sent at midnight was really touching. The best part was a scrapbook that they made and gifted me." She further adds, "It does not matter whether the gift is expensive, but yes, if I find someone special, I'll demand a luxurious gift from him!" Sigh! The prospect of getting something luxurious sounds very tempting!
However, we have all had our share of "bad" gifts. When my family and I moved into our new house, we were presented with quite a lot of stuff from near and dear ones. Among the usual set of glasses and wall hangings, we received a bed sheet set complete with two pillow cases. Now there's nothing wrong with gifting bed sheets, but when those sheets are bright pink in colour with gigantic lime green cabbages, you know there's something wrong!
That's the reason why I love the concept of giving cash (I am not a fan of gift certificates!). This especially holds true for little children on their birthdays. When I was little, I would always end up with three or four boxes of plastic makeup, which was a rage back then. My brother would be showered with truckloads of "Picnic", a much loved board game. Such "popular" gifts always took the fun out of gift opening sessions! The same holds true for brides and grooms on their weddings. Imagine the plight of the poor couple as they contemplate the future of their nth juicer-mixer-grinder!
So the next time you buy a gift, think twice. Choose something that the receiver will cherish. There are better things out there than deodorants and show pieces!
What was the crappiest gift you ever received? (My boyfriend says that no matter what the gift is, you must never criticize it. Well I can't help it!)
I just loved this post! Rima you write very very well! :D
ReplyDeleteI too just love getting gifts - luckily my hubby enjoys giving me gifts as well - so it is a mutually beneficial situation :P...
& I equally love giving away gifts as well. (BTW, I have having my first giveaway on my blog - in case you are interested) :)
The crappiest gift I got was a set of 3 face towels on my b'day from a friend. See, I know, towels are handy things to keep in your bag considering Mumbai's humidity - but face towels on my b'day?.. I just expected something, you know, not expensive, but less mundane. Anyways..
& I really think we shd start a concept of wedding gifts registries in India - I did try it out with some of my frinds during my wedding it was gr8.. I got all the stuff I needed w/o duplication. But also b;coz this was not extended to relatives, we got just one too many casseroles, flasks & DVD players..
Hey Rima,
ReplyDeleteI too love getting gifts, especially if it is packed in cute and preferably baby pink gift wrap(not that I mind any other colour ;-)
I cherish all my gifts, but the crappiest one was what I got for a Christmas while in high school. We had this system of picking chits and exchanging gifts. My name was picked by one my very good friends and in fact mine was the last name to be picked. So everyone in the class was kinda curious and were looking on.A medium sized box,gift wrapped n all.I unwrapped it and opened the box and what do I see? The whole box divided into 6 compartments and these were the things inside:
A single white carrom coin
One shoe string
One small round pebble
one hair pin
A ball pen w/out refill and
A plastic ball
And the whole class was laughing at me. I was so damn irritated, I did not speak to this girl for quite some time after that. More than the value of the gift, i felt insulted :-)
Then we passed out of school and a year later, this girl fell down from the parapet wall of the terrace and died. She was sitting on the wall studying and slept off midway :-(
So, I still remember this crappiest gift I got, with a tinge of sadness.
glad you enjoyed the post tanveer! i entered your give away right after you published it :) face towels sound pretty lame, but at least they had some utility! imagine poornima's plight! the concept of gift registries really appeals to me. it will be difficult to extend it to relatives, but at least friends understand. and you're lucky to have such a hubby! :D
ReplyDeletepoornima dear, i cracked up after reading about your crappy gift. it reminded me of my 16th birthday, when a classmate presented me with a beautifully wrapped box. i opened it with trembling hands, expecting something out of the world. what did i find? a battered shoe brush, half chewed by some dog. thankfully the real present was waiting outside the classroom, otherwise i would have killed him.
Enjoyed reading ! I love getting and giving gifts .Do drop by
ReplyDeletehttp://padhuskitchen.blogspot.com/
when time permits
Cute post. :) I enjoy receiving and giving gifts but I prefer to receive presents that I like and not particularly what the other person likes. Although I can't call any of my gift "crappy" because they all come from near and dear ones. One gift that I particularly didn't enjoy receiving was a orange coloured jute bag with embellishments. It came from a close friend and she instantly knew that I didn't like her gift. lol!! I used it as my lingerie bag for many years and in fact, I quite enjoyed using it that way. Thankfully my friend didn't mind it and was happy that I was at least using what she gifted. :)
ReplyDeletePoornima's case was quite dramatic. :D
padhu, i will definitely visit your blog soon :) glad you enjoyed here!
ReplyDeleterati, i know! "crappy" is a harsh, harsh word. but then, oh well! your jute bag incident sounds pretty embarrassing!
It was of course pretty embarrassing. I had to convince my friend that I would use the bag. She was a close friend so we even had some good laughs about the whole thing later on. :D
ReplyDeletethat's the beauty of friendship. no matter what happens, you can always laugh about it without getting too offended!
ReplyDeleteHi Rima..is a late comment here. I got meanest gifts - not crappiest - 2 to be precise. A classmate gifted me a cute little golden coloured paper box..filled with these ladybug like creatures - apparently cos I was fascinated when I saw them the first time. One was fascinating...a box full of them with their legs all wriggly...ewwwww. This was more sick than mean I guess. The mean one was I got gifted a feeding bottle nipple..cos I sound very kiddish for my age, but its just the way my voice comes out - I don't do it intentionally and I felt really bad :-( Anywayss ages back all this was..I got wayy too many dumb casseroles and alarm clocks after that!
ReplyDeletewelcome rads. any feedback, late or otherwise, is more than welcome. i thought people gifted each other insects on in the movies! i would have ran in the opposite direction and never returned.. ewww indeed! as far as casseroles and alarm clocks are concerned, i'm still a few years away from that. totally not looking forward to it! :D
ReplyDelete