Tis the season to give and many people are.

I'm always blown away by the generosity of people. Working in the community services field, I come across many people who are willing to give to those who are less fortunate, especially at this time of year.

The people who are donating are not necessarily in the best financial position themselves. They are usually the regular working person who believes in helping out. Some of them may have been helped at one time in their life and understand how even a small donation can make the holidays special.

I remember speaking to a person who had been helped one Christmas. Strangers had given her and her children an unforgettable Christmas. She had only been living here a couple of years and was still struggling financially.

The donations of food and presents for her children at that crucial time had helped this family tremendously. She never forgot that generosity.

A few years later, she was back as a donor herself. She was by no means in a great position to give, but she did. She wanted to help make some other person's Christmas special, as someone had done for her years ago.

In the same spirit I think, the City of Surrey decided to liven up our streets this holiday season.

Some of our Surrey streets look special in the evenings during this festive time. I especially love the blue-green lights on the trees along King George Boulevard stretching a block or two from Highway 10 to about 60th Avenue.

My Canuck-crazy son thought it was in honour of his favourite hockey team. I think not, but hey, you never know. There could be a Canucks fan on the Surrey "decorating committee."

What I don't get are the round fancy lights strung up in Newton. I mean, what are they?

At first look, they look interesting, then they look, ahem, really interesting. It seems the lights are jutting out at you in some visual hypnotic way.

The colours and the bling factor is another question mark for me. The person who pointed out the lights to me said they looked like an Indian design. Maybe?

Is it because Newton is heavily South Asian populated that we get these vibrant colourful lights and not the quiet blue-green ones? Just a thought, nothing more.

In the next couple of weeks as we gear up for the big day and in bidding 2011 goodbye, I say thank you to all the regular people who donated money or time to make this season special for someone.

As for the lights, some design choices are nice, as for the ones in Newton, maybe the city got a deal on this! It does make you wonder who the brains behind the choices are and why they chose what they did for Newton. Maybe it's time to get the citizenry to choose. We are paying for it and have to look at them.

Harvinder Sandhu's column appears Thursdays in the Now.