India- Day 5. Birthday edition!

India
Day 5


I had the most memorable birthday!! Words do not describe how incredibly kind and thoughtful people have been to me.

To begin the day, Anu picked me up on her motorbike. She took part of the sash from her saree to tie up her hair like a bandanna and told me to hop on the back. People on the streets seemed pretty amused watching me ride on the back! Lots of people smiled and waved. When we got to SIP, every single person working in the office shook my hand (shaking hands is big here) and said "happy birthday" and something like "many more happy returns on the day" or "may god bless your next year" or "i hope there are many more happy birthdays to follow this one" (I hope so too!). Sankari had brought me a very nice card and a present! She had remembered that I was asking about the bindi the day before (the dots on the women's foreheads) so she got me my very own set of bindi!! They are sparkly stick on ones. When she gave it to me, she said "don't feel bad though, i took some off to use before I gave it to you" Haha. Anu also got me a card and gift! She got me a vase/candleholder. So so nice.

 It was the last day of training, and it went really well. Matt showed up just before lunch to say happy birthday :) They ordered food for him as well since he was there. I had something like idlimpam (small cakes of thin rice noodles topped with more sambar) and matt had utimpam (I have no idea how any of this food is spelled). Matt is having a really hard time with the food now- he is craving good meat and is pretty sick of indian food already. When we were sitting there talking, Matt asked Sankari if it was normal for the temple workers to ask for money. She about died laughing. She said " NO! You only can put a few rupees on the tray, and it is whatever you wish they should not comment, and they should NOT ask you for money!" She smacked her forehead with her hand and said "I'm so sorry India has a big problem!"

After lunch, we went back to training for an hour and then it became party time! One of the girls that works in the office brought in a big cake box. I really couldn't believe it was for me until they opened it up and it had my name on it! Anu had remembered me saying the first day that I like strawberries, so she had a strawberry topping put on the cake. I think "Many more happy returns on the day Emily" was written on top of the cake :) I'll post all these pictures when we get back, don't worry. So, they had all the employees from the office come in, AND all the employees from the other SIP office down the street. I overheard a couple people say something like "oh make sure to take a before and after picture!" but i didn't really know what they meant yet. Everybody sang Happy Birthday to me, and then they had an extra verse also! The extra verse is "May god bless you emily, may god bless you emily, may god bless you dear emily, may god bless you emily" (sung to the same tune) isn't that nice?. So after the song, I blew out the candle, and they told me to cut the cake. I cut the first piece, and was about to serve it on a plate and they said "no no, you have to feed each other the bites!" I guess it is tradition. So I fed matt a bite of cake with my hands, and he fed me a bite (felt like our wedding day all over again!) Anu fed me a strawberry. THEN they took turns smearing cake on my face! I was laughing pretty hard, and also thinking "I really hope this is a real Indian tradition and not a joke!" They took lots of pictures of me with cake on my face :) Afterwards I (half)jokingly said "So does everybody get cake on the face or is this special treatment for visitors?" They thought that was pretty funny and they said "no no! everybody gets it! we were better to you- usually we cover your entire face!"

They also brought me in a big oversized card that everybody in the office had signed and written a nice note on. I really felt so special!

After the birthday celebrations, we went back for a couple more hours of training, and then took the final assessment. I passed with flying colors! woot woot! I had practiced a lot before coming, so I was glad that it paid off. Sankari had her husband pick us up from training in his car and drop me off at the hotel. I'm going to miss her!

We had only been back at the hotel for about 30 minutes when there was a knock on the door. It was hotel management with ANOTHER birthday cake! Shannugar (who helped arrange things for our stay) had heard it was my birthday so he asked for them to send us a cake. This one was chocolate and it said "Happy birthday Morris Emily Lonas" on the top- haha! We were already so full of the 1st cake...we didn't know if we could eat another one. I took one bite and decided to save it for later. At SIP, some of the girls asked what we were planning on doing that night to celebrate. I told them that I just want to go out to eat someplace good. We were planning on going to a  place Matt had heard about called Barbecue Nation, but they hadn't heard of it so didn't think it was good...they said "Oh you have to go to the Rooftop, you want us to make reservations?" I said sure. So they told Shannugar to make reservations at 8pm. Matt was feeling pretty ill that night (more stomach issues) so when it got close to 8 he wasn't really feeling up for it. I had had plenty of birthday fun for the day so I said it was fine, we could just skip dinner. We were already exhausted anyways so we got ready for bed. JUST as we were laying down, the phone rang. Shannugar wanted to check if we would make it to the restaurant okay. I told him Matt wasn't feeling well and he said "oh, I will come right away to check on him, does he need to go to the hospital?" I said "no, he'll be fine, we have medicine with us he'll just sleep it off" Shannugar said, "Oh so you won't make dinner?? But there is one more surprise...maybe it will have to wait til next year" Ok ok, I felt guilt tripped. I said "you know, I think matt's medicine is kicking in, we'll get ready and be there in 20 minutes" Luckily, the medicine matt took DID kick in on time. He wasn't feeling great, but he was alright. Shannugar ended up picking us up in his car since he was worried about Matt walking while sick :) He dropped us off at The Accord Hotel (location of restaurant, which is actually called Pergola but everyone seems to call it the Rooftop since it is on the highest level" It was a pretty swanky hotel! I think it is the nicest hotel in Chennai- it boasts being the tallest, with the highest view of the city. We rode the elevator up to the top floor and when it opened a lady greeted me by saying "hello, happy birthday madam." ah why yes thank you....I was feeling pretty V.I.P.!  The restaurant is famous for its chinese food, so that is what we ordered. Chicken Gong Bao, peanut chicken skewers and crispy prawns. It was delicious! And then for the last surprise....They brought out ANOTHER BIRTHDAY CAKE! Seriously- I had 3 birthday cakes. The waiter that brought it over said he would take pictures of the feeding. Good thing we learned this tradition earlier in the day or we would have made total fools of ourselves in this nice restaurant :) We fed each other bites while he took pictures. Luckily he didn't pressure Matt to smear cake on my face again!

It ended up being a great night so we were glad we got out of bed for the third birthday cake surprise of the day. 

On top of all the wonderful surprises from India, Matt of course made me feel special as well. He's always so thoughtful and caring. Thank you everybody for the birthday e-mails and facebook posts! I didn't get a chance to read them until later today but they all made me so happy! Thank you thank you! 

I am really just enthralled with this place...I'm a day behind on the updates now, but I promise I will keep them coming! Thanks for reading and for all the fun comments on the earlier posts!

Also, Matt did some other exploring while I was in training that morning, but he is asleep now so I'll have to get his stories later.