Monday, September 19, 2022

Birthday Celebrations 2022

 Cripes, today I turn half a year older and I just realised I’ve not shared about how I celebrated my birthday yet this year! Yeah, unorganised? Me. XD

So, thirty-five. Three point five DECADES old.

After a Facebook friend taught me three years ago that you’re allowed to celebrate your birthday not only on the day itself but for the ENTIRE MONTH, I thought that was a grand idea and immediately adopted it! XD I decided that every meal I had out in March would be considered a birthday celebration. Good thing I did too, because the parents were complete party poopers and only lemme out for ONE meal with ONE friend to celebrate my birthday with! *sigh* I seriously for the life of me cannot understand why mother tries so fricking hard to keep me socially isolated; she claims it’s dad who sets the rule but she’s the one who so gleefully enforces it. >< Sometimes I can’t help but very strongly suspect she does that so she can jeer @ me that I’ve got no social interaction … *sigh*

I chose to celebrate that with Annie, who’s a nurse just like mother! We decided we’d stuff ourselves silly with Korean fried chicken for dinner. Since mother actively prevents me from eating out much, I only knew that you could get Korean fried chicken from Momo’s but Annie said let’s try a place near Bella’s Fruit Market called sth like Haeduri; I’ve heard it’s actually authentic and that’s where Koreans themselves go for fried chicken.

The only problem’s that I’ve definitely got inferior tastebuds; I preferred Momo’s! XD But Korean fried chicken’s Korean fried chicken meaning I wasn’t gonna complain~

After dinner we went back to Sweet Treats for dessert but because Annie had picked me up very early for dinner (before 6pm) by the time we’d finished dessert ‘twas still only like 8:30pm and surely that’s too early to go home!

“Anything you wanna do?” Annie asks me. I joke back, “Let’s go sing karaoke!” Annie Googles around on her mobile and finds us somewhere nearby; turns out you pay by number of songs sung and not how long you sang for! That was the first time I’ve ever sung karaoke in a CUPBOARD before: seriously, when Annie opened the door of where we’d rented to sing karaoke, there was one seat for her, one seat for me beside her and the screen in front of us; that was literally it!

Turns out that place had pretty bad acoustics; while we were choosing new songs to sing, we could hear a bunch of like drunk Asian guys bawling some Chinese song outta tune!  Like, I didn’t recognise the song but there were several people trying to sing the same tune and their voices were all clashing singing different notes. XD I joked to Annie that I could do better than they could, pulled up Linkin Park’s ‘In The End End’ and BAWLED “I tried so hard, and got so far, but in the end, it doesn’t even matter; I had to fall, to lose it all…” Annie just doubled over laughing. XD

She actually chose some Taiwanese songs! I think the written Taiwanese language’s simplified Chinese? Since I can read a very little Chinese, near the end of one of the Taiwanese songs Annie had chosen I could sing one/two words. XD

Two more people that I enjoyed lunch with to celebrate my birthday: Mr. Hall (a high school teacher) and Mrs. Dent (my primary school librarian teacher aka. my Australian godmother).

While I look like my dearest dad; apparently my voice sounds like mother; silly Mr. Hall ALWAYS mixes me with mother whenever he rings!

This year was no different: I answer hello? when the phone rings, and Mr. Hall just ploughs right ahead with sth like, “Hello Ling, it’s Greg Hall here. How you doing? Listen, I remember it’s Emily’s birthday coming up, and …” Last time he did this, I interrupted him with, “Hey sir, it’s Em here!” but this time I just let him waffle on until he talked himself to a stand still. Then, he goes, “I’ve got it wrong again, haven’t I?” I laugh. “Like I told you before, sir, next time you ring and you think mother’s answered say hi Em but if you think I’ve answered, say hello Ling! Besides, you’d only mix us up for the initial hello; afterwards surely you can hear mother speaks accented English but I sound like an Aussie.” XD

We chat briefly, before I yell upstairs for mother, who comes downstairs and then arranges a time later that week when we’ll meet for lunch at The Glen.

At the restaurant, we browse the menu for lunch options and in the end I choose a pizza but lemme warn everyone that the Glen doesn’t cook pizzas well: after the pizza arrived, I lifted the first slice to start eating it, and … flop! The whole slice just dropped down limp! XD I’m not a chef: does anyone know how to make a pizza base tougher/thicker?

Nice, Mr. Hall’s a believer of dessert after meals; we both order sth sweet to munch while mother declines since she’s not a fan of sweet things. Over lunch we just all chat about how the year has been and I tell Mr. Hall how I got the Alumnus Of The Year award at Canterbury!

 

This year, my birthday fell on a Sunday. Not just any Sunday, but the Sunday ESS held a celebration to commemorate Reverend Chris being our church pastor for one whole DECADE!

In true Chris fashion, we all gathered at some local park and pigged out on KFC and bubble tea! Several people (one was Dr. Lee) also spoke briefly and shared about how Chris had been a good influence to them, etc. I didn’t speak, but if you’ve read editions of my yearly Xmas Greetings before, you may remember how Reverend Chris featured when he totally freaked me out one year when he gave me his Voice Of Authority. XD

I felt very loved that somebody actually got me this adorable red bean/green tea cake! I’m guessing ‘twas Mel Tang who did that because I remembered she Whatsapped me once asking hey Em, do you like red bean? I’d replied not really but I love green tea!

Almost forgot! The entire day was one of meals out, because it just so happened that our small group was having a breakfast social at Cache Cache! Alfee was really sweet: she gave me a pet pot plant! I named him Leafy (coz I’m so creative with names XD) but I’m very embarrassed to say he’s not part of our family anymore because I forgot to water him and he perished. >< XD

Yay for having birthday cake for breakfast! Pastor Grace found this adorable tiny little cake from somewhere that was biscotti flavoured; I’ve actually never heard of biscotti before but presumed it’s related to biscuits and ‘twas absolutely DELICIOUS! :D

My birthday dinner was back at Impressive Dumplings with the parents and Aunty A, after which she came back to our place and we all munched a slice of the cheesecake mother had baked for me. Lol, it’s been MORE THAN ONE DECADE since I last enjoyed a birthday cake from The Cheesecake Shop; like every year I ask mother can I please have a cheesecake from the Cheesecake Shop as my birthday cake and year after year she refuses, saying she’ll make me one instead. Apparently, store-bought cakes are really bad for you coz they contain lotsa added bad stuff? She couldn’t be specific on what the bad stuff is, meaning I can’t help but suspect she refuses to lemme buy a birthday cake and insists on making one for me by herself so that people can praise her and say what a good mum she is, etc. *sigh*

Next post here …either a movie review of the Minions2 movie and the minions in general/how I got the Alumnus award at Canterbury College this year! So I’ll sign off the birthday one here, say I’m thirty-five now and I suppose it’s all downhill from here … XD

Cheers~

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