PingYu Home of Hope

The 28th of January is Michelle’s 28th birthday. One of the customs here at the Home of Hope is when its your birthday to have a party. Many of the children started asking me what I was planning for Michelle. Unfortunately, most of the children were going to be gone visiting their villages on the day of her birthday and they were worried they would miss her party. So on the last Saturday before all of the kids left, I invited all of them over and planned a surprise party for Michelle. I had Hank bring Michelle into the office to ask her a question (to give me time to get the cake ready and all of the kids around the table). She was very surprised but figured something was going on because Hank stood in front of the office door telling her that she could not go out yet.

Our Family with the huge cake, “Happy Birthday Michelle”

I bought her a birthday cake, oranges, apples and an assortment of seeds (fruit and seeds are very typical for Chinese festivals, kind of like cookies and chips are in America). Eating seeds is a very serious thing here, usually we play games when the kids come to our home, but no one wanted to play anything, they only wanted to sit around the table and eat.

Home of Hope kids hanging out eating seeds

We all had a great time; some of the kids bought Michelle a few birthday gifts, she received 28 flowers, a pair of pajamas, a gold fish and a plant.
Later, on her birthday, several of the children came home early to eat a birthday feast with her. Typically on your birthday you take your friends out to eat and buy their dinner, not like what we are accustomed to in the States where your friends might buy your dinner. At first we were thinking about going to a restaurant but decided to make a big dinner at our house for a more relaxing celebration.
Thank you again for joining in on our everyday lives here in China.

Esther eating a piece of candy, Bruce enjoying Michelle’s birthday cake

FOOD FIGHT (started by Rena!)