Can We Please Stop Playing Passing the Parcel This Festive Season?

This festive season, can we please call a truce? A truce to stop playing the age-old social game of Passing the Parcel—not with music and chairs, but with gifts nobody wants.

- NAMRATA KOHLI

We've all been there. You unwrap a gift with polite anticipation, and out comes... an agarbatti stand. Yes, this Rakhi, my well-meaning cousin, gifted my son—currently living in a hostel—an incense-stick holder in silver which was black on one side and clearly seemed to be a used piece. When I asked her casually why she thought of this for him, she said earnestly, "We thought he could use it while praying in his room."

Years ago, my daughter—then a teenager—received a feeder bottle from a sister-in-law who had infants at the time. She later clarified it was meant for another child in the family who was just born and that it "accidentally" landed in my home.

I wondered—what kind of accident delivers a baby bottle to a teenager? A slip of the hand, or a slip of the mind? Either way, it spoke volumes about how casually some people treat the act of gifting.

Because a gift isn't just an object—it's a message. And sometimes, the message is that the giver wasn't paying attention at all.

Some gifts are so bizarre, they cross over from ridiculous to borderline insulting. It's not about the price tag—it's about the thought behind it. Zero emotion is bad enough, but when there's also zero thought, the gift turns from token to taunt.