I never ate any Ferrero Rochers or Toblerones, never received any presents and never had to fret over what presents to buy. Until I joined the Corporation. On the days leading up to Christmas eve, I found myself grabbing candies, wrapper bags, gift tags, racking my brain on what to buy for colleagues and checking against the list of names to make sure I haven't missed anyone out. I'm still a noob when it comes to Christmas shopping. Others have done theirs way in advance.

5 days before Christmas, I read David's post on Give Presence, Not Presents. He wrote that people don't always remember what you gave them, but they always remember how you made them feel. And that usually doesn't cost a penny. All of a sudden, I felt so silly. What have I just done? Spent $145.10 on presents which people may not remember! Oh well, since damage was done, I told myself to spend my time on writing cards instead.

On Wednesday, presents started appearing on my desk. They were all safe and predictable. You'll most likely get either (a) items with fragrance that you can apply on your face or body (b) confectionery or (c) shopping vouchers from your boss. If you're a parent, you may get (d) items for your children. When and how the present is given to you is an interesting psychology. Dropping presents when no one is around saves you and non-recipients sitting around the receiving party from feeling awkward. Dropping presents early allow the receiving party to restrategise (either "make up" or "tone down") what to give. Dropping presents late means you never intend to give a present to someone and it so happens you have excess.

On Thursday, I started bulk breaking my candies into wrapper bags and writing messages. At the same time, more presents appeared. One of it was an unexpected and personalised gift. I was pleasantly surprised at first. Then I started to feel worried because I had nothing equivalent (in terms of monetary value and amount of effort and thought put into the gift) to reciprocate. I felt so obliged to return a "proper" gift and since I still need to get a few more presents (oh my goodness what was I thinking), I decided to make a trip to the mall even though it was already 8pm. By the time I was finally satisfied with the gifts I bought, it was 9.45pm. My feet were sore and hurting from walking in my uncomfortable shoes and I haven't had dinner. What have I done to myself? That's not the end. I continued writing Christmas cards till 2am.

On Friday, everyone started distributing presents in the morning. The only person who sincerely thanked me personally was a recipient of a Christmas card which I had carefully penned down my thoughts and words of encouragement. Ironically, I did not receive a word of thanks from the recipients of the last minute presents I desperately scrambled to get last night. Before I left for the day, I opened up my cupboard and dumped the nonperishable items into a bag containing last year's Christmas presents. I rummaged through the bag to see if there's anything I could bring home and found a Winnie the Pooh towel. I totally can't recall who gave it to me at all.

David was right. It's not about presents but presence. There is a price tag to the Christmas card (I didn't have to pay for it though my sister had extra cards and gave them to me ;p) but the message in the card was priceless; literally, it has no monetary value yet it's valuable and meaningful to the recipient. It took me 2 years to realise that Christmas is just another Valentine's Day. It's a laborious, stressful and financially straining process which I am not going to go through again. That's it. I've had enough.