What should I buy her this Christmas, a photo from Manila, NCR

Photographer's Note

The word Christmas comes from the old English "Cristes maesse" meaning Christ's Mass. The Holiday celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ. The actual birthday of Jesus is not known; therefore, the early Church Fathers in the 4th century fixed the day around the old Roman Saturnalia festival (17 - 21 December), a traditional pagan festivity. The first mention of the birthday of Jesus is from the year 354 AD. Gradually all Christian churches, except Armenians who celebrate Christmas on January 6 (the date of the baptism of Jesus as well as the day of the three Magi), accepted the date of December 25th.

The custom of gift-giving on Christmas goes back to Roman festivals of Saturnalia and Kalends. The very first gifts were simple items such as twigs from a sacred grove as good luck emblems. Soon that escalated to food, small items of jewelry, candles, and statues of gods. To the early Church, gift-giving at this time was a pagan holdover and therefore severely frowned upon. However, people would not part with it, and some justification was found in the original gift giving of the Magi, and from figures such as St. Nicholas. By the middle ages gift giving was accepted. Before then it was more common to exchange gifts on New Year's Day or Twelfth Night.

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Christmas day is fast approaching and this is the time of gift giving, the problem is that I do not know what can I give to my wife this coming Christmas day, I am having a hard time choosing what to buy then today when I went with her in the Mall i saw this guys standing around going back in fort on the store window seem having a hard time choosing what to buy, looks like we have the same problem, think you can help us? any suggestion? :-)

alford, supereira, Kenny10pin has marked this note useful

Critiques | Translate

danby1 (3697) 2004-12-12 9:13

ncie note, intresting everyday shot, something each of us takes for granted, good note too, well done,

alford (3961) 2004-12-13 1:48

Your DOF here is excellent, Verge! Everything's clear from your subject to the background. Very colorful compo, too. I think it would be better if you shot this more from the side, so we can see the man's hands and facial expression, rather than his back.

About your gift to your wife, I have a suggestion: treat her out somewhere where both of you have not yet gone out before. She won't forget it, and you'll surely get a chance to take more TE shots :) Good luck!

supereira (9576) 2004-12-13 5:54