Woohoo! The big 2-5! I felt it necessary to make my 25th
birthday extra special, so several months ago I began planning my birthday
present to myself. Wanna know what the present is? It’s a 3-month stay in
India!
Since I already got myself here, I didn’t feel the need to
have a big celebration. It was a pretty calm day with two main events: 1)
Birthday cake at Aashirwad and 2) Evening dinner and drinks with friends.
1)
Birthday cake at Aashirwad
When I told the Maitri staff that my birthday was coming up,
the director, Mr. Jolly Sir, proposed taking me and Andrew to Aashirwad to
celebrate. Aashirwad is a retirement home that Maitri runs. As it turns out, I
have the same birthday as the retirement home’s manager (whose name is Bhim
Budha). So we went to celebrate together. This turned out to be a pretty crazy
experience. We got there and they busted out a cake that said “Happy Birthday”
on it. The usual. They lit some candles. Everything was going as one might
expect.
But things changed when it came time to blow out the
candles. But then Mr. Budha sir and I were both supposed to cut the cake and
blow out the candles at the time. So I had a knife in my hand and was starting
to make the first cut at the same time that I blew out a candle (I only got to
blow out one because Mr. Budha was quicker than me). Ok, so the candles are
out. Great! What’s next? I just followed along with what he was doing. He cut
off one slice of cake and held it in his hand. So I did the same thing. But
THEN he reached out his hand and I was supposed to take a bite of the cake.
Whoa! That took me by surprise. After I took my bite they encouraged me to give
him a bite of mine. So I held out my hand and he ate the small slice of cake
that I had cut off. Ok, so then this other guy, who is (as I recall) the
oldest, most long-standing resident at the home, also cut off some cake and fed
each of us a bite. I was shocked. I had no idea that was coming. Then after we
each took a bite he touched the top off each of our heads and said something. I’m
not entirely sure if I remember this correctly, but I think I remember him
saying “Bless you.”
Phew, so then the whole procession was over and I breathed a
few sighs of relief. At that point Mr. Budha and I were still expected to slice
up the rest of the cake and give everyone else a piece (on a plate, with a
spoon). The cake was delicious! But
after that cake there were two more cakes to eat! One of them was really moist
and spongy and spicy. The other was. . .I guess a marzipan cake. I don’t know
how else to describe it. I was reminded of my time in France when people served
me way more than I could eat. I felt bad turning down their offers for more
cake, but I couldn’t stand the thought of eating seconds after having slices of
three different kinds of cake. But well, that was definitely a nice birthday
celebration!
2) Evening dinner and drinks with friends
In the evening I went out with Andrew, our other roommate, and my friend from home, Justin. We went back to Gurgoan to have dinner
and drinks in the huge malls there. It was great to top off the evening by
enjoying the company of some friends! We went to a sort of makeshift Ruby Tuesdays and I ordered some pasta with lots of cheese! I had been craving cheese.
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