Day 6: We're Gonna Party Like It's Your Birthday

The climax of my trip to Cusco had finally arrived - Thursday, the day of Kira's birthday party! This is one of the reasons that I had come to town during this week because I was promised a memorable birthday party and I'd seen pictures from past events and they looked like a lot of fun. During the buildup to this day, the party planners had set everything into motion and purchased the supplies required.

But I wasn't the only one who was in town for her birthday. Vanessa and Kira had met Rov (as it's pronounced with the Spanish accent ;o) during the New Year's festivities in Cusco earlier in the month and, like the characters in the Odessy, he fell into the Sister Siren trap. This is pretty typical for gringos when they come down to Cusco and meet these girls. I can't say that I haven't been there before! To demonstrate his love, he told Kira, who had said that she wasn't interested, that he would fly down from the City of Brotherly Love just for her birthday a few weeks later. And, in true Vanessa/Kira spirit, she invited him to stay at their house since he was coming down just to see her. I gave her the full run-down on this guy and told her that she was misleading the poor guy into thinking he had a chance, but the tracks were already laid and there wasn't much that could be done by the time I came down there.

To further the plot, he called her two days before her birthday and said that he had come down with a case of seafood poisoning, cough cough, and wouldn't be able to come after all. But Vanessa let me in on the secret that he would be there on the doorstep the day of her birthday as a surprise.

I woke up Thursday mentally prepared to get my hands dirty cleaning up the spotless house, helping to prepare the Mexican food (as the local expert ;o), blow up balloons, etc. , as the Sumars had said that it would be a very busy day for everyone getting ready for the 30-odd people that were going to come over that night for the birthday party. They also had a handful of maids that were from their grandmother's house that were there to help out. They were already hard at work cutting up the chicken into fajita-sized slices by the time I even woke up and got ready for the day.

An hour later, Vanessa came home from picking up the cake with an extra surprise on the doorstep - Rob...I mean Rov! Not only was he there, but they had waited for flowers to be delivered to the market so that he could get the lily bouquet that they had ordered and were the only ones that could be found in town. And, as an additional token, he brought Kira a brand new iPod Nano and USB converter that put my personal gift to her in shame, along with perfume for Mrs. Sumar and a set of books for Vanessa, which didn't make me feel awkward at all, honest. But I should take lessons from this guy because he was the number one gringo in town at that point. I guess the things that I brought down were more of expectations while he and his gifts successfully utilized the element of surprise.

And then came the party preparations. This essentially involved me trading MP3s with Vanessa's computer while the maids prepared the meat and beans for the evening and set the table for lunch. Their aunt, uncle, and two cousins came over at lunch time and we were treated to a great meal prepared by the maids. The relatives seemed very very friendly and we had a nice discussion (through translators) about architecture and technology in China (he is a well-known architect in Peru) and I wish that my Spanish was better so that I could get more involved in the conversation, as always!

After our long lunch, it was time to be put to work - blowing up balloons. The first thing that came to mind was that despite not being a smoker, my lungs were really weak - at sea level. I have a hard time blowing up a balloon normally, let alone 300 at 12,000 feet above sea level. Lucky for me, they weren't very good at it either so they had little hand pumps for blowing them up. So I sat down with Dayse, the daughter of the maid, and got to work filling the floor with balloons. She had a system down and I couldn't figure out how she tied them so quickly. She showed me over and over again and I just couldn't figure out the steps. After about 100, I finally nailed the system and was busting them out in tandem with her. In addition, she was a friendly college student and I got to practice the little Spanish that I knew (which improved throughout the week) and found out a little bit about her - and the disco Las Vegas (see the next blog).

After a a few hours of balloon inflating and after sustaining multiple battle wounds to my raw-from-the-latex fingers, we had all 500 inflated and the floor was, as Vanessa called it, a mattress of balloons. People began trickling into the house at this point and I finally met some of the people that I'd seen on Vanessa's friend list on Hi5 (Latin America's Myspace, on which of course I have a fully updated profile ;o) and some people that I'd met earlier in the week or that I'd heard about before. By this time, the special hidden reserve of tequila had already been tapped into and the fun was just beginning.

Then, the laptop-turned-DJ started playing some real authentic music for a Mexican party - mariachi music! But through the tequila-inspired haze, I realized that the sounds quality was too good to be on the stereo and a group of mariachi musicians strolled into the room, complete with a ginormous guitar, violin, crooner, sombreros, black & glittery costumes, etc. This was too awesome! And of course with any mariachi music there has to be dancing, so people took turns dancing with the birthday girl while the band just played away for about an hour or so. To simulate the feeling of a Mexican party, gunshots were replicated by stepping on and popping my precious, self-sacrifice-inflated balloons. Oh, what the hell, I stepped on a few myself!

After the band, it was getting late but there was still some time for food! I dropped the liquid diet and made myself a few tacos and fajitas along with everyone else. There was so much food prepared, there was no way that we'd ever finish it off. Speaking for myself, I know that I'm not able to plan very well for more than two people, let alone thirty! Being a Thursday night, most people had to work the next day so the crowd started to thin and just a few of us hung around (mostly since we were already home ;o) . Even though the birthday girl doesn't like it, Kira was playing some salsa music on the laptop so I got to practice a bit more of the Latin music and finally had a chance to dance with the girls on an open dance floor, which didn't last long because I don't like it when partners just critisize the way you lead. I always find that with some people I have a good dancing connection but with others it just doesn't work out right. You quickly find these things out when you learn in big groups like I did back in the day.

The final treat of the evening was at around 2:00 when I was beckoned from my room because Kira and Vanessa were going to give me and Rob - I mean Rov - a demonstration in Arabic dancing, which they learn in their Palestinian cultural meetups. One thing that's interesting about Arabic dancing is that when a man and a woman dance, they get very close to each other, but never actually touch. That sounds about right from the little I know about the Arabic/Islamic cultures, though.

Yusteen, I'll always remember the image of their mom staying awake until 2:00am, smoking a cigarette (she's not a smoker)! Good times!