Birthday celebrations- changing traditions-24 Oct 2012

Birthday celebrations- Changing traditions (This is another note of my anecdotes, sometimes I could be far from reality and does not have any academic rigor) (Also this does not mean any offence to anybody. Any unwarranted offence felt is deeply regretted) 1960s/70s Celebrating birthday was a non-event for some/most of us born in 60s and earlier. During my childhood there were occasions when my parents bought me/us new cloths. There were also occasions when we distributed candies/sweets among classmates. But the main point is that it was not mandatory for parents to do all those things. It was also not our right to impose such things on our parents. May be there were many occasions when we were not given new cloths for us and candies for our classmates and friends. There were also occasions when somebody in the friends’ circle celebrated his birthday in some grand manner, accordingly there were feelings of jealousy also. But birthdays were never the discussion topics. 1980s As I entered intermediate and then degree colleges also the same was the situation. Not much of importance was accorded to the celebration of birthdays. But after leaving Silver Jubilee college, one friend, Ajoy Kumar made it a point to send birthday greeting cards to the address where I was staying. He practiced this for a few years and then left it as my address was also changing on a continuous basis. But as I entered IRMA, the situation completely changed. A new understanding of the birthday celebration came to me. Wait, hold on a minute. I am referring to the “Bumps” way of celebrations!. Many of my classmates were given bumps on the early hours of their day of the birth, when they were in campus. Of course this was limited to boys. The birthday boys were subjected to pushes, pulls, drenching and all sorts of gymnastics. No need to say, I did not receive any bumps during the two years, as I was an obscure and struggling (struggling for grades then and now struggling with career) classmate. For a variety of reasons, I escaped their attention. 1990s Then after becoming parent of my elder son, I started inviting family friends etc for his birthday. Cake was cut, food etc were provided, photos were taken. This photo culture was much absent in my early days as the technology has not reached the present day proportions. The offices/organisations I worked during that time had only the culture of celebrating the founder/chief executive’ birthday. Ordinary staff’s birthdays were not given that importance. 21st century Then we have got our second child. It is just a coincidence that his birthday is the same as mine. So it became a bonus for me. Whenever his birthday is celebrated, if I am in town, people celebrate my birthday also. So I also cut the cake, be part of the photographs etc. Since the second child feels it is his right to be celebrated, I also get the undue advantage. Digital cameras have entered the scenario. We click and preserve the photo either as a hard copy or as a soft copy. In 2005 I joined a charity organisation which believed in the celebration of every staff and contributes small budget for that. The staff is made to cut the cake, and is also given some gifts from the money collected from other colleagues. As a token of appreciation the staff also reciprocates the other staff friends with something else. There were occasions as email was ubiquitous and you receive e-greetings. Post 2010 This is the era of Facebook. It connected classmates, colleagues, friends wherever they are on earth. Facebook takes the input of the date of birth of the member and displays prominently on the D-day. This attracts the attention of other members on the social network and prompts them to give wishes to the birthday person. Life has been made easier. No need to remember birthday of a person/friend. If you open FB on any day, if your friend’s birthday falls on that day, you are reminded of it. Then you can post on his/her wall or send him/her a message. Of course there are still some people who don’t believe in birthday celebrations and they don’t mention the same on their profile. Only if you know their birthday in your mind, you can wish. Otherwise it is really difficult. On the other side, the Facebook birthday messages can be seen as plastic greetings (like plastic smile) and may not have the human warmth and personal touch. But FB gives the opportunity to be wished by somebody whom you have never met physically. Thus Technology gives us a very good opportunity. Lets see what is in store for us in future!