Birthday!

Yesterday, May 3rd, was my birthday, I must say, it was one of the best birthdays I've had! The team here makes such a big fuss about people's birthdays, so I knew there would be some acknowledgement, but I had no idea just how much. Not only that, but the MD threw in a few surprises as well.

The whole team sang happy birthday to me at our morning meeting first, and one of the kids, Georgie, gave me a gift - this beautiful necklace she'd found for me. I was really touched.

Next, the Communications team I'm working with held our morning meeting in the cafe instead of the office. I love the cafe, so this was a much appreciated treat. They presented me with a basket of goodies, which included an ice cream scoop and ice cream, some gift certificates to the cafe, and some VCD's. I loved it! Then they sang happy birthday to me.

I loved the next part even more. For each person on team, they usually will pick an MD theme, and decorate your workspace with that theme on your birthday. For mine, they chose The Body (as in, The Body of JC). So I walked into the office, and this is what I saw:

I laughed so hard!! The arms are styrofoam, and on the wall above they had covered the window with the colorful fabrics, and put up body parts like noses, ears, and eyes, and pasted a verse onto each about the Body. They are so creative! So I sat in that chair all day. And my back is to the door, so any time someone came in, I could hear their reaction to it. So many people, on first glance, thought it was me with my arms and legs out. :)

Throughout the day, anyone who passed me wished me a happy birthday, which I just really enjoyed. The MD then gave me a few gifts as well.

Kara and I needed to go up to the warehouse for some things, and as we walked through, I saw these 2 lamps that had just come in that I really liked, and they matched my apartment perfectly. Mark, who works in the warehouse (and I taught his 3 kids last year) told me I could take them. Yay! Later, this program I have been wanting and needing to load on my computer for ages was finally loaded for me by one of the computer guys. Again, perfect timing! I also really needed a Chinese speaker to input Chinese characters for this document we are producing, and if you read my post called "The Thorn in my Side" you will know this isn't easy to find. So I sent a message to our volunteer coordinator just to see if he could find someone for me, and not too long after that he came up with someone who was able to input the Chinese for me. Hurray!

After work on Saturdays, we have this time called "Celebrations" where everyone gathers for about 15 minutes, has some cookies and crackers and fruit, and we celebrate the week we've just finished. Every week, they acknowledge birthdays, so 2 others and I got a cake and were sang to again.

After this, I had decided to go across the street for a celebratory dinner, and had invited people along. I haven't been here too long yet (7 weeks to be exact) so I wasn't sure how many would come, but there were about 20 of us! The only downfall was out of 20 people, I got my food last because they forgot me. But fortunately I wasn't starving because I had actually been treated to lunch as well earlier that day!

After dinner, Maz had made this delicious banana cake, so everyone came over for cake and to hang out. It was lots of fun!

Finally, I called my friend Claire on Skype to have a nice chat, and wound down the great day that it was.

Thanks to all of you who e-mailed me, Facebooked me, and sent me e-cards yesterday. I feel so, so loved!!!!

Here's a quick selection of pics from last night (I realize you don't know these people, but you can see a little of the assortment of people I work with here):

Maz and me:

Philski and Isaac

Richard, Josh, and Api

Helen, Bethan, and Steph

Julia and me