I look around at my life... I am living in Shanghai, China. I have a degree and job (that is more than many can say). Sure, I am single, but I am living the dream... and I am only 25! My life has just begun and I anticipate growing older and learning more in the next quarter of my life!
So how did I celebrate this momentous birthday? SICK WITH THE FLU! Would you believe that this is the second year in a row that I have had the flu on my birthday weekend? Christina thinks that I have birthday anxiety and that the sickness is in my head.... but my stomach doesn't agree with that statement. I woke up feeling horribly nauseous on Saturday. My roommate made me breakfast in bed (because she is the bomb!) and I thought some food would help. Feeling a little better, I prepared for the rest of the day that my girl friends had secretly planned out for me! All of our birthdays are really close together - in February and March - so we decided that for each birthday, we were going to blind fold the birthday girl and plan a big surprise. For Anna's birthday, we kidnapped her from school, blind folded her, put her in a taxi and took her to this amazing sushi restaurant for dinner. Then we went to the most amazing cafe for dessert! We were not able to plan anything else for her because we all went to Suzhou for the rest of her birthday weekend.
For me, my friends kidnapped me from Costa Coffee, blind folded me and through me in a taxi. The idea of being blind folded was rather funny when it was someone else, but I did not love it, and the combination of an upset stomach, a blind fold and a Shanghai taxi ride proved to be a deadly combination. I had to take the blind fold off after a couple minutes because I was pretty sure if I left it on, I was going to throw up all over the taxi and my dear friends! So they ended up taking me to a place called Munchies! It is a small whole in the wall place with sandwiches, hotdogs, chills and bomb milkshakes and desserts and I love it! I had not eaten there in a while, and the girls had never eaten there, so it was pretty perfect. Well, it would have been perfect if I would have been able to actually enjoy food. I was feeling so sick that I couldn't even eat the bread off the sandwich that I ordered... and forget about the peanut butter chocolate milkshake that I was dreaming of. The girls enjoyed it and I took my sandwich to go.
The girls had other things planned for my day as well, foot massage at my favorite place, followed by a hair wash and style at the salon down the street. Then a small gathering back at the apartment to pregame before the party bus that night. We did not make it to the foot massage or the hair salon because we figured it would be best if I went home and slept a little bit more so that I could feel better for the party bus.
I tried just about everything under the sun to calm my stomach, but 30 minutes before everyone was set to arrive at our apartment, I was still vomiting, shaking and weak, and doubting attending my own birthday party. I put on my best happy face (and a lot of extra make up) and tried to enjoy the night. While everyone was hanging out snacking on the fabulous food and doing shots Amy made, I was doing my own shots of pickle juice and chocking down crackers. Pickle juice may sound strange, but I swear it helps calm my stomach... and I just really like pickle juice.
Next, we headed out to the party bus. I knew that it was going to be dangerous because the nausea got worse every time I got into a moving vehicle... how the heck was I going to have a good time on a bus? But I told myself that I would try to stick it out as long as I didn't vomit again. I had as much fun as I could. I sipped on some sprite (claiming it to be an alcoholic drink) and declined all shots that were bought for me. I even danced a bit, and mingled with people pushing everything else into the back of my mind.
(pictures taken from Drunken Dragon Pubcrawl Shanghai)
I was shocked, but I made it to two bars - Brix then Geisha. When I walked into Geisha, I knew it was going to be the end of my night... it was crowded, hot and smokey, and only made me feel worse. I stuck it out for a while but eventually had to leave the club to get fresh air. I was ready to jump in a taxi home, but my friends were not ready to let me call it a night yet, so they carried me back on to the bus for one more bar. I rode the bus to that bar, then walked straight off the bus and into a taxi headed home. There was no way that I was going into another bar. Let's be frank... it is impressive that I made it out at all feeling as crappy as I did, and I managed to make it til midnight without vomiting.
Thank goodness I am really going to be celebrating my birthday in Hong Kong next weekend, so I don't really feel too bad about missing out on my actually birthday night! Me, Amy, Anna, Christina, Dawn, Nadya, James and Paul are a deadly combination, but I cannot even begin to image the fun that we are going to have! Look out HK... we are about to tear this city up!
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