Happy birthday to me!

I was a little skeptical of what my first birthday away from home was going to be like. After all, we don't really do much to celebrate at home anyway, and I wasn't really expecting much over here. And, when you think about it, I can't really take much credit for my birth, my parents should be the ones getting the party for a) conceiving me, and b) keeping me alive long enough to see 23.

Well, I was greeted this morning by 1 dead cockroach (which Keiko had valiantly slain the night before) and 2 that were yet to die but in that helpless position of surrender belly up to the ceiling. I guess their position, which was practically crying out "kill me", was the best birthday present they could muster, so my first act of the morning was stomping the guts out of the poor suckers.

School today was long and pretty stinking boring for the most part. Our international health module was great with this maverick-like doctor teaching us about disaster relief and how some students from MSIH tried to get involved in helping vaccinate kids in the Sudan during a meningitis outbreak (their plans were thwarted by the administration). The doctor teaching us treats everything like it's an epic story, and really knows how to keep a class on the edge of their seats, so that truly was an amazing part of the school day, but other than that, it was seriously one of the dullest days we've had in a while. And to make things better, Keiko, Deb and I have a 60-70 minute presentation to give tomorrow at 8:15 for a prompt which we received this afternoon, which meant straight to work immediately after class.

So, we head over to the Caroline house and get started researching our topic and finding good tables and graphics and whatnot, order some amazing pizza, and type, type, type away on our presentation. Then, around 8:30 or so Paul sneaks his hand around the corner and turns off all of the lights in our room. Then about half the class walks in carrying a cake, watermelon, cantaloupe, avocado, and ice cream, singing happy birthday. I was amazed at the number of people who showed up (I think on short notice). To make things even better, Priya bought me broccoli!!! (which is kinda hard to find here and a little expensive--it's funny how the little things really start to mean the most).

There were a bunch of other little things that really touched my heart today. I didn't really broadcast that my birthday was coming up. I'm not someone who wants a lot of attention directed at me, and I didn't want to go out and party or go out to some expensive place to eat, so there really wasn't much of a reason to make a big deal out of it. And yet still, almost everyone in my class knew and wished me happy birthday...not because someone announced it or because they heard someone else say it, but because they somehow found it out on their own (facebook does really help with that). Minsoo even called me this morning to wish me a happy birthday because he wasn't going to be in class in the morning and wanted to make sure that he got a chance to do it. I got emails or g-chat messages from other people who weren't in class. Noam offered to buy me whatever coffee I wanted (which ended up not happening because the machine was broken on our floor). I don't know...today it just really came together for me that as much drama as their may be at times, at least from my perspective, our class really is a big family.

So, in the end, it was a great day. A baby cockroach even greeted me--in my room no less--when I got home (it too met its death). I guess somethings never change.