Janam Din Mubarak Ho means Happy Birthday in Hindi

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  Lucknow, India
Monday, November 19, 2007

This last Wednesday was my birthday, marking my "official" entry into my mid-twenties. Although I was excited to celebrate my birthday in India, I welcomed the day somewhat reluctantly since this was the first birthday I've spent out of the U.S., away from those of you who usually help me celebrate (thanks for all the emails and cards, by the way!). However, I usually don't make that much of a fuss about my birthday, so I figured that I'd just have a low-key day at work and maybe plan a nice dinner out with a few friends over the weekend. Little did I know that my birthday was to be a day of celebrating and of more sweets than I could possibly eat.

I decided to use my birthday as an excuse to do some baking and to test out a recipe for "stove-top cookies" that I planned to bring into work for my colleagues. So, the night before, I made the dough and cooked the cookies one by one on my tawa, the small round griddle used to make chapattis, paranthas, and other Indian breads (roti). To my surprise, the cookies ended up tasting good, though no one would know that from their slightly blackened appearance. After the cookies worked out, I got ambitious and decided to make frosting to cover the burned cookie tops. Thanks to my blender, whose wonders never cease, I was able to whip up some pretty good frosting too.

My birthday celebrations began early the next morning with a call from my mom as I was walking back from the gym. When I got home from the gym, my landlady presented me with a small box of brownies and pieces of cake, quite a delicacy for India, where sweets are of a totally different variety. And when I got to work, Sharon gave me a box of Indian sweets that she had gotten from the good sweet shop (Mithai Walla) across the street. I knew that I was in for a sugar overload. At the morning staff meeting, everyone somehow seemed to know that it was my birthday, although I only recall telling one or two people. And just in case someone forgot to say happy birthday, one of my colleagues made it his job to remind each new person that joined the meeting.

I had a pretty busy day at work, as I'm helping my boss coordinate a civil society meeting with the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health who will be visiting India at the end of the month to report on maternal mortality in the country. So, my work kept me busy until lunch time, when I brought out the frosted cookies I had made to share with everyone. Homemade cookies aren't very common in India, so I had to explain to many of my colleagues what these things were that I had made, and I even did a little coaxing to get them to try my creations. Although they definitely weren't as tasty as cookies made in an oven, I think that most of my colleagues liked the cookies, and I was glad that I finally showed them that I could cook SOMETHING that tastes good (in contrast to my many failed attempts at cooking Indian food).

At the end of the day, my colleagues called everyone into the meeting room. I was trying to finish up something for my boss so that I could leave on time to head to my Kathak class, so I at first thought I could skip out on this meeting since I assumed that, like most meetings, it would be in Hindi and I wouldn't be able to understand much. However, my colleagues insisted that I come, and so I finally agreed and came into the meeting room where everyone was already gathered. I wasn't expecting anything more to be done for my birthday, so I was completely taken by surprise when I saw that the office had organized a birthday party for me, complete with cake, candles, singing, etc. I blew out the candles and helped cut the beautiful little cake. We then sat around and exchanged songs, poems, etc. Some of my colleagues, mostly the men, had what seemed to be "love poems" on their cell phones, which they read aloud to the group, making everyone laugh. One poem in particular is worth mentioning. Unfortunately, I don't remember it word-for-word, but the last sentence went something like "Friends are like pages in a book, but YOU are my index page." Likening someone's lover to a book's "index page," is, in my opinion, not the most romantic metaphor, though it makes sense that my colleague who read this poem is a quantitative research assistant...not exactly the type to use flowery language.

Because I didn't want to skip out on my own party at work, I made it to Kathak about 20 minutes late, but I still managed to get in some practice and was able to share the cookies I had saved with the teacher and my friends from class.

I would say that this birthday experience far exceeded my expectations! And since my cookies were a hit, maybe I'll make them a "birthday tradition" and bring them to work for everyone's birthday, that is, if I can manage to not burn them.

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