My friends threw me a surprise birthday party last Saturday night. I couldn't have asked for a better birthday gift. It went down like so...
Ranjana invited me over for dinner and said she was going to cook. During my commute to her apartment I ran into two other friends who happen to be going to her place too. Since we often gather in groups, I thought nothing of this at the time. I assumed Ranjana had invited them to celebrate my 24th with us. After getting off the bus I called Kiki, a good friend of mine here, and asked her to join us for dinner at Ranjana's. She responded to my request with "thanks, but I'm staying in to watch Gossip Girls tonight." Disappointed, I hung up the phone without letting her know how absurd I think the show probably is (even though I've never seen it) and continued to walk on towards Ranjana's imagining the home cooked mystery meal that awaited me.
Once we arrived I was tired from walking and plopped my ass down on a chair to recover; small talk ensued. Ranjana asked if I was ready to cook. Damn! I thought she was going to cook for me. I told her to give me a second to sit and that I would love to help her in time. She proceeded to tell the guys she didn't haven enough food to feed them. I thought this was a little rude at the time, but wasn't in the place to ask them to stay with it not being my home. Dan and Kofi said it wasn't a problem and that they would grab something on the street and come back later. Ranjana told the guys they didn't need to leave right away; we could all go on the balcony to have a chat before getting started in the kitchen. I lazily got up, not wanting to go back outside into the heat, and sauntered over to the balcony doors behind Ranjana. She drew the curtains and a loud "SURPRISE" erupted from the mouths of 15 of my friends.
The whole thing caught me off guard. I was truly surprised. It was no coincidence Dan and Kofi were on the same bus as me and Kiki wanted to stay in on Saturday night to watch Gossip Girls. We celebrated my birthday that night by getting western food for dinner. You can never go wrong when you go western. And although Ranjana and I never actually cooked we did share a large Hawaiian at Pizza Hut that night. Then they bought me a sundae and sang Happy Birthday. It was the best birthday to date.
Thanks to everyone for making it happen:
Ranjana, Serena, Cody, Megan VA and Megan O, Scott, Lucie, Kiki, Lori, Kofi, Dan, Alison, Ian, Fred and Jeff
