Otanjobi Omedeto means Happy Birthday

“Happy Birthday to You! Happy Birthday to You! Happy Birthday deeeeaaarrrr Jeeeennnny! Happy Birthday to You!!!!!” This is possibly the best song that gets sung only once a year. Now I realize that the song gets sung over and over through out the year, but each person really only gets it sung to them once a year. Friday we got to sing it to my beautiful wife Jenny. Yes on Friday, November 16 my wife turned 24. She was very excited for the big day and kept asking about her present. But I told her that she would have to wait to find out.

We started the evening by going to the store to pick up some necessary supplies. First we had to purchase some gifts for a birthday party on Saturday. Then it was downstairs to get the fixin’s for fajitas. We grabbed onions, peppers, corn chips and some beef. We were all set for fajita fun. Now all we needed was a birthday cake.

We walked down to the Andenken Bakery. Jenny had to pick out her birthday cake from an amazing array of delicious deserts. She chose a white cake covered in fruit. They even offered to write Happy Birthday on it. The real shock, for them, came when we asked if they could write it in Japanese. I am fairly sure that her jaw almost hit the floor. Then she asked again in broken English if we wanted “Happy Birthday” written in English. We assured her that we wanted “おたんじょび　おめでと” written on the cake. She gave us a worried look and hurried off to write our message. At this point we were all prepared for an evening of bacchanalian birthday fun.

We walked on home and started cooking Jenny’s birthday dinner. We had all we needed to make some marvelous Mexican food. We created a spread of foods that was quite impressive. We had steak, onion and pepper fajitas, guacamole, real cheddar cheese, lettuce, tomato, sour cream, and plenty of tortillas. It was a feast and we enjoyed each morsel of it. We then finished the meal with a big slice of birthday cake.

Then it was time to open present. Well, yes there was only one present to open. Logan and I bought a jigsaw puzzle for Jenny featuring characters from the movie “My Neighbor Totoro.” I know it doesn’t seem like much of a gift, but Logan and I wrapped each of the one thousand pieces separately. It took quite a bit of effort on her part to open the gift, and when done this way it sure seemed like she got a lot of presents. Now all she has to do is assemble the puzzle, which she spent some time doing that evening.