The Big Fat Indian Birthday

In the six-odd years that I have been chaperoning my kid to birthday parties, I’ve figured that party-wise, there are broadly two kinds of city parents: those who work on their kids’ birthday parties with the same determination that soldier-ants take to gathering food, and those who, like the grasshopper in the folktale, simply outsource the stress.

The soldier-ant-type of parent (mostly the mother) frets, plans and slogs for the birthday party, tearing out her hair and getting irritable bowel syndrome on the evening before. Fathers are usually assistant-sloggers, perfect for random running around and sacrificing their pollution-weakened lungs to blow clusters of balloons.

The grasshopper-type parent, meanwhile, hands it all over to a new breed of professional – the event manager. Mum and dad make a few phone calls, sign a few cheques, and go for a film or a pedicure. The event manager will take care of everything from food and ‘games’ to ‘décor’ and return gifts.

It’s weird, but both grasshoppers and soldier-ants take distinct pride in their ‘different’ parties. Stoically, the soldiers flaunt their small, home-made (everything from invites to the food and entertainment), parent-driven parties. The grasshoppers meanwhile take pride in the fact that their kids’ birthdays are large-scale, ‘exciting’ and more importantly, managed by the hired help. I’d like to state here that I’m a soldier-ant-mum, and I have my husband’s fatigued lungs to prove it.

Growing up in the ’70s, for us a birthday party meant paper plates, chips, a sandwich and a piece of lurid Mongini’s cake (unless your mum could bake). It meant money in an envelope which was pressed into the birthday kid’s hand, and went straight to his mum or dad. And it meant some noise, some Rasna, and ok-tata-bye-bye. It was held once every two or three years, when your folks felt they could afford a small do, and that you deserved a treat.

Welcome to the Noughties, to post-globalized India, where if it doesn’t hurt the wallet, it’s not just worth it. These days, even toddlers’ birthday parties are event managed, catered affairs, where excess is everything. Mummies making kids pass the parcel are actually a dying breed now – though the soldier-ants among us do try to hold on to this tradition desperately.

I’m quite an old birthday-party hand now, thanks to the kid. Five parties out of the ten we attend have one or more of the following:

1. a bouncy castle which teeters close to the sky and looks downright scary
2. glittery, eco-unfriendly, thermocol ‘princess’ banners featuring sundry Disney Princess/Spiderman/Ben 10 which are supposed to define the party’s theme
3. a young college-student-type who speaks with a weird accent straight out of an Andheri East call centre as the Master of Ceremonies – my daughter calls this person ‘the manager’
4. rehearsed performances by the birthday kid’s older sisters/cousins, featuring highly-sexualized Bollywood numbers – you cringe, but since the parents look at you like their child just ended world hunger, you nod and say, ‘Verrrry nice…’
5. a magic show (with frightened animals) + a tattoo artist + a caricaturist + a hair braider-and-colourer (sprays horrible chemical colours on your child’s head, but never mind)

Overall, it’s meant to feel like a carnival, a mindless motion of money and ‘enjoyment’ so that the birthday kid, her friends and their parents know exactly how much the hosts can spend. After the kids have run through the counters, it’s time for the ‘games’, sundry toe-curl-inducing competitions. Like ‘pick the dad with the biggest paunch’ or asking the father of the birthday kid to choose the best dancer among the assembled mummies. Sometimes the ‘manager’ makes the kids dance competitively, handing out prizes to 13-year-olds who shake it like Sheila.

At the party of a 4-year-old boy I attended, after professional clowns had romped on the stage and left, we were in for a hitherto unknown treat (the ‘clown item’ was new, but what followed made it seem common-place). The MC invited the headmaster of the child’s playschool to come up and ‘say a few words about the birthday boy’. Huh? The guests’ jaws dropped in unison. Listening to a speech in praise of someone who has just about stepped out of diapers was a mildly surreal experience.

Return gifts are serious business these days and can make or break a mum’s street cred. The event-managed do’s have piles of Disney bags, folders, water-bottles, tiffin-boxes and melamine-laced plates-and-spoon-sets. It comes as no surprise that every party has the same caboodle of plastic crap, made, no doubt, in the dark by-lanes of Shenzhen, China. And brought to you via Crawford Market.

In a perfect world, a birthday party would mean experiencing something new and life-changing. Learning about fish or butterflies, a trip to a farm, a nature walk or a fun session at the museum, or a craft activity at home. So that everyone, adults and kids alike, could celebrate the milestone in a memorable way. Till that happens, let’s at least work towards less wasteful, more conscious and aware birthday parties. It’s a dirty job, but some-mum’s got to do it!