christmas and gift giving

the organizers had just concluded the 3 day toy convention, wherin  parents flock to
the 2 halls opf Megatrade to visit their  favorite toy booth, to buy presents for themselves
mostly. and for their children and god children. GIFTS. they are associated w/ Christmas.
today is Dec the 15th. salary day. perfect for that Christmas shopping and traffic agony.

its 10 days to go before Christmas its the season of gift giving , Christmas parties, going
to the Mall, kids to the toystore, your  amusement parks and resorts and swimming.

for companies, its the start of the merry making gift giving, monito monita, kris kringle
exchange gifts. I thought before , whoever  invented gift giving during this time of the
year will be the richest inventor dead.

have you ever wondered who invented Christmas? the church. and who invented
gift giving?

One of the main reasons we have the custom of giving and receiving presents at
Christmas, is to remind us of the presents given to Jesus by the Wise Men:
Frankincense, Gold and Myrrh.

some researched facts:
Frankincense was a perfume used in Jewish worship and, as a gift, it showed that people 
would worship Jesus. now Gold was associated with Kings and Christians believe that 
Jesus is the King of Kings. Myrrh was a perfume that was put on dead bodies to make 
them smell nice and, as a gift, it showed that Jesus would suffer and die.

All over the world, families and friends give presents to each other. Most children around
the world believe in a Christmas gift bringer. It's often St. Nicholas, Santa Claus or
Father Christmas.

'Twas the night before Christmas' has redefined our image of Christmas and Santa
Claus. Prior to the creation of the story of 'Twas the night before Christmas' St. Nicholas,
the patron saint of children, had never been associated with a sleigh or reindeers!

The custom of hanging stockings comes from the story of St. Nicholas.

ho ho ho! Old Saint Nick or Santa Claus- We see him on advertising posters, in parades,
at departments stores...who is this guy and why does he have so many aliases? Well, the
original St. Nicholas lived in southwestern Turkey in the 4th century. As the bishop of
Myra he was credited with doing a number of miracles involving sailors and children.
After his death this led him to become the patron saint of both groups as well as for
unmarried girls. As a saint he was given his own "feast day" that was celebrated on
December 6th.

At about the same time Nicholas lived, Pope Julius I decided to establish a date for the
celebration of the birth of Jesus. As the actual time of year for this event was unknown,
the Pope decided to assign the holiday to December 25th.

Eventually, Saint Nicholas's feast day also became associated with December 25th and his
connection with Christmas was established. A tradition developed that he would supposedly
visit homes on Christmas Eve and children would place nuts, apples, sweets and other items
around the house to welcome him.

in 1823 , a poet named Moore written a poem and was published anonymously as Troy Sentinel. It became very popular and has been reprinted countless times under the more familiar title, The Night Before Christmas.

and how about rudolf? and  reindeer? made a few google searches and learned that the
Saami people of Finland often used reindeer to pull their sledges around and this

found its way into the poem. Reindeer, which are much  sturdier animals than North
American deer,are well adapted to cold climates with their heavy fur coats and broad,
flat hooves for walking on snow.

well I made a few research, Ive read that Norman Rockwell's 1921 cover for the magazine
shows Santa with his modern red and white theme.

The Coca-Cola Company began its Christmas advertising in the 1920s with shopping-related ads in magazines like The Saturday Evening Post. The first Santa ads used a strict-looking Claus, in the vein of Thomas Nast.

As time went by, more and more was added to the Santa Claus legend. Thomas Nast, a 19th century cartoonist, did a series of drawings for Harper's Weekly. Nash's vision of Santa had him living at the North Pole. Nash also gave him a workshop for building toys and a large book filled with the names of children who had been naughty or nice.

by the beginning of the 20th century the standard image of Santa Claus was a man in a red suit trimmed with white. The Coca-Cola company has often been cited for cementing the image of Santa with the colors red and white through a series of popular advertisements in the 1940's depicting Saint Nick enjoying their product (Coca-Cola's company colors are red and white)

My friend William Henry Chua is a coke collector, my friend Lawrence too is a coke collector
it made Santa popular and it made collecting Coke toys and paraphernalia so popular to
this day and thats what we learned through the years, Christmas is associated with presents,
gift giving, and being jolly like Santa !  Ho Ho Ho!

Children in the UK, USA and many other countries, such as Japan, open their presents on
Christmas Day, December 25th.

One popular way of giving presents in groups such as clubs, school classes and
workplaces is  to have a 'Secret Santa'. This is where you pull the name of someone else
in the group out  of a hat (or other container!). You then buy a present for that person.
When the presents are  given out (often at a Christmas party) each person is given their
present but they have no idea which person in the group bought it for them!

Almost as popular as Santa himself is his lead reindeer with a very very shinnny nose- the
glowing red nose reindeer, Rudolph!
the story of Rudolph can be traced back to Robert May in 1939. The company's
owner thought  they could save some money by printing their own books and asked
Robert to come up witha story. that goes like this: a reindeer who saves the day for
Santa on a foggy Christmas Eve.

With a hit song written in 1949 by Robert's brother-in-law, Rudolph earned a permanent
spot in American Christmas pop culture.and thus the song we all know to this day.


Happy christmas to you. and to all, A silent night.
this is your LOVERBOY Dennis Signing out. Felis Navidad!