Themed gift exchange... uhh??

[Neko]

Sir Neko's family is doing a random gift exchange this year. It's themed so that we each get assigned a country. Ours is Italy. Should be easy to find a gift that fits, right?

...But I'm totally drawing a blank.

I love getting or making gifts for specific people. It's the one customary thing about this season that I look forward to.

This format though... um... uhh... what do? Gift cards are out, that's no fun. Other than wine, like, "Italian" themed decor doesn't suit anyone in the exchange. Ahh...

I'm going to try World Market by the mall but I'm wide open to suggestions.

[melsbells]

My favorite thing about Italy is the tarantella, but uh, it doesn't exactly sound like you could gift a song and dance, or a ticket to the tarantella festival in Italy. If I was in your situation, I would start making pasta.

[Sonic#]

God, I feel like that theme is begging to lead to national stereotypes.

Off the top of my head, you could go espresso, opera, fine art, gelato, Spaghetti westerns, the Borgias (or similar items), Roman items, sauces, sausage, Papal items, pine nuts, canal boats, olive oil, and a fair number of Shakespeare plays.

[Neko]

God, I feel like that theme is begging to lead to national stereotypes.

Oh boy, for sure. I'm expecting the exchange to be rather cringy.

ETA: Ultimately, I bought a premade gift basket. It has a couple varieties of pasta and sauces, a bottle of chianti, a wooden spoon, and the "basket" is a colander. I had planned to put together a basket of snacks but this one was just better all around.

[Chococat]

I like that the basket is a useful item! Good call.

[Neko]

^ The person who got it said the same thing. The gift seemed to have been well received.

The exchange was notably non-cringy. Everyone brought food-based presents for their countries.

We ended up getting the Germany themed gift: A gift card for a local restaurant (not strictly German but offers German fare) sandwiched between single-serving packs of sauerkraut.

The crate of Mexican snacks/beer had a Sacred Heart of Jesus candle. Perhaps that was in poor taste but it brought cultural appropriation into the conversation. That honestly caught me by surprise.

[geldofc]

Late but I would've suggested those cool looking stove top espresso makers. Apparently people use those in Italy and they're only around $20 on Amazon. I'm getting one for myself soon! A country themed gift exchange sounds fun.