Another Year Around the Sun

Well, I did it guys. I made it successfully around the sun one more time! While this wasn’t the first birthday I’ve had away from home, it’s the first I have had outside of the USA, and definitely the first on the African continent! And…it was also the first birthday that was celebrated with a surprise party!

I was honestly not sure what the day would hold for me when I woke up on my birthday. I have been told that birthdays are celebrated differently across Rwanda…in some areas a birthday means having a party and throwing water on the birthday girl/boy…in other areas birthdays aren’t really celebrated at all; so I was prepared for anything.

During the day, my host family didn’t bring up my birthday at all, so I figured that maybe they didn’t celebrate birthdays here. I was a little sad, but also ok with it. I had been receiving lots of love from people back home and my fellow cohort members, so I figured that was good enough.

The day progressed as normal. My host parents went to work, I played with my host brothers, and it was overall a good day. Then, after dinner, my host father asked me to go for a walk with him. It seemed a little abrupt, but we also have gone on evening walks previously so I didn’t think much of it. We strolled around our village but when we made it back to our house, I knew something was up… all of the lights in the house were off. My host father was also helplessly grinning, so that definitely gave it away that something was up.

Before we went inside, my dear friend and host family member, Alphonse, came outside and cleverly asked me for my phone saying he wanted to take a picture of the sky. He then kept my phone (which I found out was to take pictures of the event on it).

Then I was ushered inside the dark house. As soon as I entered, the lights were flipped on and I saw the smiling faces of my wonderful host family and even some of our neighbors and their children. They all started singing happy birthday, and all of the kids threw flowers on me like confetti. While I was gone, they had decorated the walls with balloons, and set a nice table cloth on the living room table and brought out a cake. Everyone sang happy birthday in three languages (English, Ikinyarwanda and French), and I was so overcome with joy and gratitude that I’m sure I was just stupidly smiling the whole time. We then cut the cake and while we ate, some of the adults gave some very nice speeches about me and each other’s hospitality. We all hugged and laughed and ate cake until we couldn’t eat anymore.

Even to this day, I can’t help but grin from ear to ear when I think about that day. Not only was it the first surprise party I’ve ever had, but it was thrown by people that I met a mere month ago. I am constantly humbled and grateful for the incredible amount of love and hospitality that I experience every single day here.

I honestly and truly hope that everyone can experience this level of radical hospitality at least once in their life. But even more than that…I hope that everyone can give this level of radical hospitality, because that is what we are truly called to do.

Until next time,

Marie