Random Musings

I wouldn’t say that I’m the best at choosing gifts, but I do enjoy the act of gift-giving quite a bit, especially to close friends.

And the last few weeks I have been doing a fair bit of gift-giving, to a variety of friends young and old.

I gave out some candy canes to some of the children in church last Sunday, and it was quite a joy…both for me as well as for them.

Over the last few weeks I’ve come to realise a few truths about gift-giving.

1) Never underestimate the power of a gift.

I think that one should never underestimate the impact of giving a gift, however insignificant it may be in terms of monetary cost, to someone.

If even adults can be moved when receiving a specially-wrapped packet of three Ferrero Rochers during a carolling stop, then what more the impact of a nice jolly big red-and-white striped candy cane to a child during Christmas season?

There is something special about reaching out one’s hand and claiming that special gift that someone has bought for you.

We may see it as “Ah, it’s a less-than-two-dollar item I’m giving out”, but it’s actually more than that.

It’s the fact that someone actually went out there to choose a gift for you and paid for it and brought it to you to give it to you.

That’s how you should see it.

That the candy cane may only cost less than two dollars is immaterial.

I think any child would much rather grab the candy cane than receive even ten dollars in the pocket.

It’s the same reason why I think that Soup Spoon’s new concept of giving you “stored redeemable value” in your membership card is nowhere near as good an idea as their original concept of “get a free bowl of soup if you accumulate 10 stamps”.

I can’t really be bothered about getting 100 redeemable points (equivalent to $1 off) every time I spend $10 at Soup Spoon.

It means absolutely nothing to me really, from a consumer-enticement standpoint.

That free bowl of soup every time I get my card filled with 10 stamps means so much more to me, cos it’s both a tangible and a desirable reward.

I’m not sure if you’re still following my drift, but anyhow…

2) Sometimes less is definitely more, especially when giving gifts.

I realised that when it comes to gift-giving, “one” tends to be the magic number.

More isn’t necessarily merrier in this case.

Sounds ironic, I know.

Sometimes you may like a particular friend more and want to give the friend more than one present…but if you think about it, it isn’t always a good idea.

If you want to give, try to give just one thing.

Unless you really need to give more than one thing.

I personally think that giving someone a candy cane + a bar of chocolate isn’t as special as just giving that person a candy cane.

Or a bar of chocolate.

Think about it…how special can it get if you were to say “Here’s a candy cane…and a bar of chocolate for you”?

The person wouldn’t know where to look, or what to focus on, and it just dilutes the effect that one single item would have had.

Yes, call me strange, but I firmly believe that.

It’s the same reason why you never write two songs to a special someone at one go.

You always just give one, because one will suffice.

Cos even if both songs were great, somehow you probably wouldn’t get the same desired effect as compared to if you were to just had given one song, cos i) if both songs were great, then it just means he/she would have to remember two great songs instead of one, and ii) if one song was better than the other, then the lousier song was just kinda redundant.

(The above example is purely a hypothetical, for illustrative purposes only.)

If you think I’m just rambling nonsense, I wouldn’t blame you.

I think I tend to think too much into too many things sometimes.

But that’s just me.