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Look

Metropolitan Museum of Art


On any given day in New York City, there is at least one exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art that your friends would love to see yet end up skipping, dreading the huge crowds, school groups, and deafening noise. Now that you’ve run out of time to mail a gift or deliver it in person, consider a museum access pass, which costs $110 and allows the recipient to visit for free and, most importantly, during off-hours when the museum is closed to the general public. If not the Met, then the Museum of Modern Art and Brooklyn Museum of Art offer similar online passes that they will showcase as a present from you. (metmuseum.org; moma.org; my.brooklynmuseum.org)Alessandra Stanley

Diet

Noom


“Not because you need it, darling. You’re perfect just the way you are.” That’s what you should say when giving someone a Noom subscription, but they will thank you come January 1. Though giving a weight-loss aid can seem a little hostile, Noom is not just for shedding the holiday-cheer pounds. It’s really a wellness app, affording fantastic lessons and reminders on how to think about the relationship we have with food as we navigate the world’s many stresses. A six-month gift subscription should help a loved one get in the right mindset and adopt lasting good habits that make the prospect of summer’s dreaded bathing-suit season feel less frightening. ($179, noom.com) —Anjali Lewis

Donate

Doctors Without Borders


There is at least one person in your circle of friends and relatives who really does have everything and is impossible to shop for. And given the miserable state of the world, there is no better time (or easier last-minute gift) than a charitable contribution in their honor. The problem is always, which one? Many Air Mail reporters have worked in war zones, in Afghanistan, Ukraine, and Gaza, or earthquake disasters and can attest to the heroic work done by Doctors Without Borders. The international humanitarian NGO was co-founded in 1971 by Bernard Kouchner, a French doctor and former government official, who created it after witnessing the Biafra famine during the Nigerian civil war. The organization won a Nobel Peace Prize in 1999, and it still gets top marks from Charity Navigator, a nonprofit organization that rates charities for efficiency, transparency, and effectiveness. (from $5, doctorswithoutborders.org) —Alessandra Stanley

Read

AIR MAIL


Not to be immodest, but AIR MAIL is a great choice for friends and relatives who long for a smart, funny, and sophisticated weekly publication, the kind of international-newspaper weekend edition that no longer exists. Ours is online and comes via e-mail, but every Saturday issue looks and feels like a lush magazine from years past, yet with stories, reviews, photographs, cartoons, and columns that are very much of the moment. Air Mail looks expensive, but a gift subscription is actually shockingly affordable. And if you think about it, our digital weekly is another way to save trees. ($39.99, airmail.news) —Alessandra Stanley

Spend

Hallmark x Venmo


You can give someone a digital gift of music or books, but let’s face it, there isn’t a child, nephew, or godchild that would not secretly prefer to receive cash instead of a Kindle book or an iTunes gift certificate. So there is a virtue in the necessity of a last-minute gift of cash for young relatives who do everything on Venmo anyway. Hallmark offers Venmo greeting cards, and that provides a veneer of good cheer to your much-appreciated gift of cold, hard cash. (hallmark.com) —Alessandra Stanley

Plant

Million Trees NYC


It’s a little late to buy a Christmas tree, let alone send one to a friend. But you can come close by giving an online donation to former mayor Mike Bloomberg’s charity Million Trees NYC, a nonprofit that aims to plant a million trees in New York City, to mitigate against the extreme heat generated by climate change as well as to offset the sterility of urban life. You can’t actually donate a tree that will bear the recipient’s name, but you can assure your friends that somewhere out there, in a park, on a sidewalk, or in a community garden, their tree is making New York a better place to live. (from $5, milliontreesnyc.org)Alessandra Stanley

Issue No. 232
December 23, 2023
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Issue No. 232
December 23, 2023