Asian Birthdays

OR HOW I'VE FORGOTTEN HOW TO CELEBRATE BIRTHDAYS LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE

I hope that one day I will have a normal birthday. You know...the kind celebrated with friends, family, delicious cake, some presents, some cards, in your own community. Well in the last 5 years, I've had my birthday in the States twice. Sure, traveling on one's birthday is excellent. Glamorous and privileged. But often, when I travel, I travel alone. For every birthday since high school, in America and abroad, I've had to rely on people I barely know to help me make the moment special.

I blame it on the day. January 10th, what an awkward day. Right after New Year's, a little farther after Christmas, Hanukkah, Diwali, Winter Solstice, and Kwanzaa. People are just tired and gifted-out by the time the 10th rolls around. In Maryland, it is always cold, usually sunny, and perpetually brown. When I was little, I would always wish for snow as my birthday present.

That wish was granted on my first birthday away from Maryland -- Oberlin winter term 2007, my freshman year. I was one of the brave, and perhaps stupid, few who stayed for a Dascomb WT. It was cold, snowy, and lonely without most of my new friends around. With our cooking, we all set off the fire alarm at least once a day. (The day before my birthday, we set it off twice.) I had no plans for the day. I was just going to attend my TIMARA class, which was my WT project. Suddenly there is a knock. Old Mr. Gibson himself was outside my door! He wished me happy birthday and handed me the worst chocolate cake I've ever eaten. The surprise cake delivery was my mom's idea; what a memorable one at that.

2008 found me in north-western Germany. I was staying with my now-grown-up-with-a-family former au pair and her husband and sweet child. The couple works for the British military: he as a military police officer, her as a former military police officer, now as a military-families-only child welfare counselor. Britain maintains bases in Germany, which was why they were stationed there. I lived with them for 5 weeks -- chilling in their house working on personal projects, watching their baby and dog, and occasionally traveling to major cities in or around Germany on a Eurail pass. I had wanted Indian food -- so we splurged and went out to what looked like a nice restaurant. The meal was pretty bad, and we strongly suspected that they were microwaving our food in the back. But it was so lovely being around them, and having a family when I was so far away from home.

I turned the big 2-1 during 2009 in Mexico, a country where no one checks your age while drinking, as long as you pay for your drinks. I was studying Spanish for 3 weeks in Guadalajara. We had epic field trips every weekend; luckily, my birthday fell on one of them. We spent the day driving through the mountains surrounding the city, visiting a picturesque lake,and a chilled-out hot springs. I decided to go on this program without knowing a soul, and we, as a group, had only had about a week to get to know one another. So I announced it was my birthday and hoped for the best. I gathered a few new friends together and we made a crazy trek through the city to find this Cuban restaurant. The restaurant was urban chic -- writing and graffiti purposely covered the walls -- and the food was to die for. The food was so good we came back a few times in our 3.5 week stint in Guadalajara, included the night of Obama's inauguration. After food and a few mojitos, we ended the night at a discotheque. This club, like many we went to in the city, had a dance floor but no dancers. So it was us, the awkward Obies, who started the dance party. The festive birthday tequila shots helped. Epic, indeed.

My senior year (2010) birthday found me in Oberlin again. I was participating in the Shansi WT, learning to teach English by reading lots of pedagogy, getting teaching tips from Kim Faber, and trying our lesson planning skills out on a few willing foreign Oberlin Conservatory students. A few of my friends were also learning to be teachers, one of whom I had met during my stay in Guadalajara. My apartment was lonely without all four housemates. So I spent many nights inviting people over for games, Elyria-bought Indian food, and good times. My birthday was no different. I held it in my living room. I made a tasty pineapple and sprite special punch that we drank out of Sesame Street waxy paper cups. As presents, my friends brought over cakes, cookies, and candy. We all nearly passed out from the extreme amount of sugar! And after lighting candles on a pile of cookies and singing "Happy Birthday", we played Apples to Apples. Four hours of Apples to Apples. My friends, new and old, shuffled into the apartment for four hours straight, and to entertain them, I just kept on playing. And playing. And playing. It was an exhausting and fun time.

So this year, in 2011, I was in India. I was staying at a yoga ashram in Rishikesh. My birthday fell on the night we normally did kirtans -- a form of meditation where you bang on noisy stuff while chanting in call-and-response style. Every one would take their turn at the mic, if they dared. The yoga teachers always went first, leading chants in sanskrit. Then it was our turn. We could sing whatever we wanted, in whatever language. While many of the ashram students chickened out (I blame it on us being all Western), I never did. I always look them up on their offer, singing everything from "Wade in the Water" to "Over the Rainbow" (Israel Kamakawiwo'ole style). After we we all sang, my favorite yoga teacher took the mic again. He started singing me happy birthday. The drums started pounding. The shakers started rattling. He threw in Hindi and English phrases of good fortune. He then gave me a box of barfi, which I handed out, piece by piece, as the group of teachers and ashram students sang a more familiar version of "Happy Birthday", sans drums. Along with the desserts, I got a card, bought by this sweet American couple, former peace corps volunteers in Jamaica, that everyone had signed earlier, none too discreetly, while the kritans were being performed. A third of the box of barfi was left after firsts and a quite few seconds were passed out. "It's your birthday. You have to finish the box. Otherwise it's bad luck," said my favorite yoga teacher. I stuffed my face with the sugary, chalky barfi until the box was empty. Yummy! I had diarrhea the next morning.

Why have one Asian birthday when you can have two? On March 10th, two month late, the foreigners threw me a party. We met at my house, where my Chinese friends gave me hair clips (my hair was too short of them), a puzzle (I hate puzzles), bananas (2 dozen bananas), and an unripe pineapple (which they put salt on). We snacked on the fruit before leaving for the restaurant. We ate at my favorite restaurant in town: shrimp and squid dry hot pot. Alexandra and a Chinese friend were missing from most of the dinner, and when they returned, they had a huge box! That evening my China-induced dreams were fulfilled...they had bought me a cake with a huge dragon on it! I am born during the year of the dragon, and come on who doesn't want a cake that is half cake and half icing (all cakes in China are like this) in the form of a mystical beast? The foreigners toasted my health and happiness over SNOW beer and baijiu. Following Chinese tradition, a paper tiara was put on my head and all my friends started decorating my face with icing. Alexandra got so into it that she put the entire dragon's head on my face. James started calling me "Queen" (we both get two birthdays) and sang a drunken rendition of "Rule, Britannia!" in my honor. These lovely people even paid for my share of the expensive cake and meal. We then leaded back to the house to watch a favorite movie of mine, Shawn of the Dead. A delightful night. Though I got the icing off eventually, my face was stained blotchy red for the next day or two.



I wonder what next year's birthday will look like. What country will it be in? And with which friends?