Indian Birthday Party

We've been taking it real easy in Bodhgaya india soaking in Indian village life and watching the Buddhist monks. A friend staying at the same guest house as us named Mani has introduced us to a family living in a shack beside the road that serves chai tea and meals to passers by.

Mintha

Their home is about ten by ten for a mother, two daughters, and a son. The walls are made of brick covered by mud. The roof is bamboo, thatch, and tarps. The place is well kept and clean despite the dirt floors but at the same time this is not the kind of place a traveler should be eating at if they would like to avoid food borne illness. Never the less we have eaten and taken tea here two nights in a row.

On our first night, we learn that the younger daughter Mintha is turning twelve and we are invited to her birthday party. We agree to show up.

When we arrive chai tea is made and they clear out the bedroom section of the shack. This involves lifting what looks like a large coffee table out of the room and putting it in the street. The coffee table is in fact the bed. Blankets are laid on the floor. Both the daughters are making a huge fuss over preparations. Balloons are filled and hung from the ceiling along with paper streamers.

Mintha is extremely excited about all the party supplies they purchased. She keeps opening her cake box and telling us how much everything costs. She also has purchase a knife specially for cutting the cake. The birthday song is activated as you cut. It's probably the most freaky knife I've seen. An Australian man had given them 500 rupee (about $12.50) earlier in the day and they spent just about all of it on this party. This might sound odd for a poor family except that her birthday also falls on the first of a three day Hindu festival called Diwali. The first day is in warship of the Hindu god Lakshmi and involves spending a lot of money in belief that letting money go easy helps money come back to your family easily in the future.

With preparations complete, we begin with a Hindu ceremony. Mintha is given markings with some sort of red spice followed by Erica, Mani, and myself, the guests of the house. Next they light some incense, a little white pill is also lit on fire in a plate along with rice. It is waved around the birthday girl's face and the guests then the rice is thrown atop our heads.

Mintha's Big sister. Mintha beginning second
attempt at cutting without the candles.

After the religious ceremony, it's time for the birthday song. They light all the candles on the cake and just chant "happy birthday to you" about 10 times then the girls immediately start chopping the cake. Keep in mind the candles are still lit. Apparently in India blowing out the candles isn't a part of this ritual. Also when I say chop I really mean butcher. The candles are falling into this poor little cake and the things is being stabbed to death. Finally they resolve to digging into it with the fingers and hefting it into plates made of dried banana leafs. They also fill a second set of plates with small hard candies and some sort of stuff I can only describe as the salty mixes often found at a bar.

Erica, Mani, and I are served the plates and according to some custom I'm only aware of now, the guests must eat before everyone else so we start digging in. The cake is immediately followed by dinner which is a bit frighteningly cold. We eat it anyhow and hope we didn't make a horrible decision (not sick 12 hours later...).

As we finish up dinner the girls are dumping out a ton firecrackers and rationing them out amongst the other children. For about two hours they are blasting them off having a fantastic time while we lounge near the house drinking chai. Firecrackers have been going off over the last week or so and more and more go off every night as we near the third day of Diwali which, as far as pyrotechnics are concerned, compares the the fourth of July in U.S.A.

This is basically the most intimate we have been with an Indian family up to this point. The whole event was awesome and I can only hope we have additional opportunities to meet more people.