Happy Birthday Ma

Happy birthday Ma!



Every year there has been a confusion, whether it is the 28th January, or the 29th. (The confusion is mainly created by my aunts (rather my pishis, father's sisters), who out of hurry tends to wish Ma on the 28th itself, though there was never an early bird prize for this. So, many times I had also called up Ma on the 28th to wish her happy birthday, where as all through, Ma's Birthday was on 29th (quite natural though, as birthdays never change).
This year, I was extra cautious, and extra certain that it was never 28th, and made my mind up to call her on the 29th evening, as the last caller to call her. So that she has to wait a little till she recieves my wish. "Soburey meowa foley"!
We also had a plan to dine out together a day after on Saturday on a newly opened restaurant by the name of Krazy Kebab near the Park Circus crossing. It was a choice made by Baba and surfing through the simple and yet catchy website of theirs, it seemed that it was not a bad idea to venture out there for the birthday dinner.
Things went on as planned till the evening on the 29th of January. That is to say, I did not call her the whole day.
I finally gave her a call at around 9. Dead tired after a long and tiring week, that was the last work I intended to do on that Friday night. I rang her on the land line first without success, may be they are out to a have dinner together. Then I tried the mobile number, but it was switched off! In a movie theatre may be, I thought. I needed to try again after half an hour, but my body did not have the energy to stay awake, the last thing I managed was to arrange for a surprise for the Saturday Dinner!
I woke up next morning, and the the cell phone clock showed a neat 1:28 AM! But I could not sleep the rest of the night. Guilty pangs may be. On not being able to wish her happy birthday even when I am just a local phone call away from her. Since it was too early to call at that time of the morning(!) I had a long wait till the breakfast after which I actually called her. So what happened in effect of all this caution was I again missed the 29th. And worse of it all, this time I was on the wrong side of 29th. I was definitely the last caller to wish her, at least something went according to plan.
The next thing I could do was to wait for the evening pray for everything to go smoothly.
The Saturday evening started off with the Kolkata traffic snarling at us all through out our
travel route from Kakurgachhi to Park Circus. We reached late, later than my parents did. They
were already there, and the whole place knew that we were late and was as if waiting for us.
The hour that followed went smoother than our dreams. Baba had already placed the orders, and his choice of foods were as always impeccable. Ma was enjoying each bit. But most importantly, Debarghya was in one of his greatest moods, no tantrums, and no signs of any hyperactivity. He sat through the entire dinner, showing great patience in waiting for the starters to arrive, and even in between the starters and the main course!
The surprise followed, although, my impatience was a give away a long before the cake arrived on the table. The candle was lit on top of the Cookie Jar Chocolate Trufle. Baba was giving the all knowing "I told you" smile, while Ma was definitely overwhelmed. Debarghya was not able to hold himself up, started the Happy Birthday song without any prompt and jumped across the table to cut the cake.We carried the happiness in the ambience along with us out of the resturant into the chilly night outside.
So all was well as it ended well. We dropped Baba and Ma home on our way back from Krazy Kebabs.

I also tried to take a few photos of the moment itself, but my son's enthusiasm came in the way. The best that I could manage is this, where Baba is obviously trying to capture the enthusiasm of Debarghya in his mobile.