Funny Habits, Or The New Trend?
This week I got an invitation for a birthday party in Germany. Being invited to celebrate a birthday with friends is always an honor and was really happy to get the invitation card, even if most likely I'm not going to attend, but this is besides the point right now.
What surprised me was what was written on the card. Along with the information about the venue, how to get there from the airport, along with phone numbers, there was a special request as well. The inviter said instead of a birthday gift, they prefer a donation to their favorite charity and then listed the bank details you need in case of fund transfers.
Photo by Ahmet Yüksek ✪ on Unsplash
Before you jump to conclusions, I have nothing against donating and helping those in need, I'm doing it constantly one way or another, but this request is odd in so many ways.
A birthday is a special occasion in everyone's life and should be celebrated in a memorable way, with family, friends and loved ones each year. This includes gifts that are specially bought of handmade for this occasion, that the birthday person can enjoy at the event or later, depending on the gift.
We have a saying in Hungarian, "ajándék lónak ne nézd a fogát", which translates in English as follows: "don't look a gift horse in the mouth".
This classic idiom means that when you receive a gift, you should accept it gratefully and not complain, criticize, or try to find flaws in it. (In the old days, a horse's age and health could be determined by examining its teeth, so inspecting a gift horse's mouth was considered rude and ungrateful.)
Photo by Fiona Murray-deGraaff on Unsplash
I think English speakers say "beggars can't be choosers". Regardless of how you say it, it's not really about the cost or value of the gift. Intention should count more, sometimes a home baked cake brings more joy than a pricy gift and there are gifts that don't have a price, just value.
With this donation method the whole joy of gifting and with it, surprising the birthday person goes out of the window, unless you place a lot of zeros on that donation, to knock them off their feet.
Photo by Martin Masson on Unsplash
For me, it kind of feels like a mandatory thing and ruins the whole thing. Everyone's donation can be and will be tracked as you get the bank statement and depending on the case, you can be judged according to the size of the donation. This is not what we do here, even if you want to collect donations for a good cause, you don't connect your birthday to it and let people gift you (or not) what they want.
The world is changing though. Events are the same as always, but getting celebrated in bigger and bigger ways. Parents are booking a restaurant for their kids graduation from kindergarten, which is pure madness if you ask me. Take your kid to the park, spend a day with them, buy them a cake or whatever food they like, but inviting everyone you know to a fancy place, just because the kid grew old enough to leave kindergarten is pure madness. They do this when the kid graduates from elementary school and so on till they are reaching adulthood. It makes you wonder what counts more, celebrating the event, having fun for a day and making nice memories with people you care about, or collecting the envelopes, which is mandatory these days.
Photo by Rubén Madila on Unsplash
Except this case, I'm lucky to have family and friends that still know the value of these events and you don't hear them saying: "I don't care if you don't attend, but you have to send me the envelope", but others are not that lucky and imagine the taste in their mouth after such a day and the feeling they can never forget, not because it was so good, but because it's shocking and makes you uncomfortable.
I don't know about you, but I personally don't want to know what society is going to be in 10, 20 years in this regard. I'm ok with the old fashion way and some thing should not change.
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We have the exact same saying here, identical
I don't mind if one prefers charity over a gift, but it should be anonymous, not where I can be tracked to see how much I donated, then people are gonna judge regardless of your economic situation...
I think good times were 80-90" for our society, and it's getting worse year by year
At some funerals you can find a box for donations and now that the number of wreaths are limited and people don't waste money on these anymore, you just drop your contribution and help the family instead of helping the florist. I don't mind at all and this can be done at birthday too, but ... looks like they need evidence of where the money comes from. Or I don't know.
never seen this one at funerals here, i guess in that moment they are not interested in money
Yes.
Old fashion or good manners? Celebrating a birthday like this is how morally shallow, narrow-minded individuals live. They existed in the past and they'll exist in the future.
When I was a teen, I remember my dad had a birthday party, and one friend gifted him an expensive electronic device and another friend presented a pot with a crocus. The first friend owned two factories and the second friend was a doctor in a governmental hospital. You aren't better or worse when you earn more money, people just live different lives, and friends exist to enjoy living alongside each other and supporting each other. Friends is when you present a crocus, and feel respected, welcomed, and wanted.
Yes, back in those days people knew what good manners means and they made sure to respect it. Now it seems the more "liberal" you are, the cool you think it looks. Your story shows how money changes you and some people make sure to make you feel it too, which I hate.
A present should be symbolic or something that gives you joy and should not be about the price of it.
This says it all. No more words needed.
Hello!
I suppose since I've seen donation requests instead of gifts sprinkled along the way in the last some years, I haven't thought that much of it.
I have seen funerals where the online funeral page indicated a voluntary donation to a charity, many times a charity that researches whatever condition the deceased died from or a Hospice or the such, in lieu of flowers. So far, there is no restrictions on the number of sprays, plants or wreaths (to my knowledge), so I always looked at it as voluntary and never thought about it being tracked. Interesting.
I have only seen a birthday or two offer that as an option to gifts and usually it was for a birthday for someone very old that did not really need or have a place for a lot more things. I never asked, I just supposed that was why there was an alternative.
Face book started that years back, not really like your personal party though, where you could pick a charity if you wanted and it would announce something about donating to this person's charity for their birthday. That was unappealing to me as it seemed you were asking everyone you were connected with to donate, even though nearly none of them would be invited to a party if you had one. How rude!
I think if it were me and I was actually going to the party, I would take whatever gift I normally would, specially if it would have been homemade.