Argentine Birthday

Yesterday was my birthday. On Sunday at church we celebrated October birthdays. I ended up being the only October birthday present. Monday, Cristina, Chris and I had lunch with our country coodinators (Kate & David). They had cake (mango cheesecake!) and sang to me (in English). On my actual birthday, I celebrated with dinner and cake in my apartment with some of my friends in my community. Today, we celebrated October birthdays at the comedor and Beto made sure that I was included. He announced for the children to make space for me at the cake table so I could blow out a candle, too.

In Argentina, I have observed that birthday celebrations tend to be a dinner with family and friends. The celebration is typically on the persons birthday, regardless of what day of the week. So I celebrated the Argentine way. We had my dinner earlier then normal though because I wanted to get to bed early because I had to go to the comedor today. So we ended around 10:30pm. Most people eat dinner here around 9:30/10:00.

Two other traditions for birthdays that I learned about yesterday are 1) you make 3 wishes (but don't tell them) before blowing out your candles (they're really generous here!) and 2) instead of you "birthday spanking", they pull your ears. This doesn't seem to be something that is done regularly, but one of the teenagers at the comedor pulled each of my ears 25 times! (Nobody else did.)

We had talked earlier in the week about doing dinner on my birthday, but never had solid plans - pretty typical for here. Around 6:00, Chris and Xiomara showed up and invaded my kitchen preparing pizza and cake. Others showed up a bit later. I had a great time! (I'll post pictures sometime next week.)

This was my first birthday outside the US and my first summer birthday. Technically, it's still spring, but yesterday it was around 90 degrees. I've never had weather that hot on my birthday. I will always remember my 25th birthday in Argentina - pizza, cake, friends, and HEAT! As I was sitting here enjoying my birthday last night, I was looking around at my friends and thinking how wonderful they are. We didn't know each other 2 months ago and here they were celebrating my birthday with me!