BA Birthday!
My favorite day of the year is December 3rd- my birthday! My birthdays are usually painfully depressing or bland. To avoid these two options, I chose to plan my birthday instead of relying on other people. And it rocked.
For lunch, Pedro and I went to Garbis (Scalabrini Ortiz and Cervino), an Armenian restaurant. I chose the restaurant because the buffet is free on your birthday. The food there is pretty decent- lots of eggplant and olives- but I wouldn’t go there if it wasn’t my birthday.
Afterward, we waddled to the Jardin Botanico to meet up with Estelle, Olivia, Hannah and Steven. We weren’t just meeting up to hang out- we were going to feed the cats. I bought a bag of cat food and we visited three out of the five cat colonies in the park. (A word of advice: when feeding the cats, give each a separate pile of food. If you just deposit the food in one big pile, the cats will fight each other.)
After we had fed the hungry cats, we chilled out on the grass and drank some mate. The red flower you see attached to my dress is a birthday present from Estelle. It worked well with my blue dress.
Then, a group of volunteers from the Jardin Botanico set up a table right across from us and began a puppet show. At one point, they asked “Is it anyone’s birthday today?” and all of my friends started shouting and pointing at me. The puppets then began singing “Feliz cumpleanos” and at the end of the song, said “Happy birthday, young boy.” All of us were really confused until a group of about 12 children celebrating a birthday came over to watch the show. Oops!
I went back to Pedro’s and he made me waffles. At around 10, Francisco, Carolina, Lita, and Estelle came over for drinks. We ordered drinks (I love delivery!!) and celebrated. Turning 21 is rather anti-climactic in Buenos Aires, since I’ve been able to purchase and drink alcohol for the past few months. Nevertheless, I will always remember Quilmes Stout as my first “legal” drink.
After we were all a little bit tipsy, I Skyped my parents in the USA. They sung me happy birthday and then I invited my friends to talk to them. Francisco kept doing silly things, and my dad jokingly warned him: “Hey, mister, I can be in Argentina in 12 hours! Watch it!”
All in all, one of the best birthdays of all time!
