Happy Birthday Ryan

Last weeks was Ryan’s birthday. We didn’t do much to celebrate it because it was on a Wednesday, and that is the day we are both very busy.
But, I had to do something so I secretly ordered a cake. With the help of some students I went to a local bakery and looked through their huge stack of cake books. There was dozens and dozens of designs. Since this was his first birthday in China I decided I wanted something very Chinese-y.
First I was going to get something based on Ryan’s Chinese Zodiac symbol, the rabbit. But the rabbit designs were a bit, well, lame. Then I focused on a bunch of similar styles that had peaches and old men on the cake.
“What’s that one represent?” I asked my students.
“That one is for birthday,” they told me. “But it’s usually only for old people.”
So I crossed those off the list as well. The cakes that kept drawing my attention were the dragon cakes and eventually that’s what we all settled on. (My students said it was ‘very cool.’ You can see the actual cake in the picture above.)
Since both Ryan and I had class in the afternoon I hid the cake in our office and went to class acting like everything was normal. I told my class about the secret, and told them that we would be delivering the cake towards the end of class. They “ooh’d” and “aah’d” when I explained it to them.
So at the end of class I ran upstairs, grabbed the cake, and we started Operation Cake Surprise. Normally Ryan has class in a room right next to mine. But, unfortunately for us, he decided to take his class outside that day because the weather was nice. I knew he was taking them to a nearby garden area so while me and most of the students waiting in the parking area a few students went ahead as scouts.  (This picture is most of us waiting for the scouts to come back.)

We found his class and quietly snuck around will we were almost on top of them. Then we burst out of the trees singing happy birthday surprising the whole class, most of all Ryan. The kids from both classes were so excited and practically exploded when Ryan gave me a quick thank you kiss. (Public displays of affection are not common here.)
In fact, kids whipped out their camera phone and were taking a ton of pictures which quickly found their way onto the internet. All the students have QQ which is a Chinese Facebook, and soon the pictures were spread far and wide. Within a few hours I was having upperclassmen and teachers writing me emails about it. And now we are infamous among our students for being such a ‘romantic couple’ all for a simple birthday cake.

Overall it was a fun event especially as we all got a sugar buzz because 90% of the cake was frosting. Happy Birthday Ryan!