Moldova PCV says Birthday surprise adds quirky touch to barbecue celebration
Birthday surprise adds quirky touch to barbecue celebration
The sky clouded over, the air cool and threatening rain. My friend Liliana had invited me to her daughter’s sixth birthday party in the woods near their place in Posta Veche, on the outskirts of town.
At her apartment building, Liliana loaned me a jacket (later, while we took a walk after stuffing ourselves with food, I found a 100 lei note, about $10, in the pocket. "Nicole, you’re lucky!" she cried). Liliana and her mother brought out pots and kettles of food for this picnic, while her dad, a man who can scarcely contain his mirth, beamed with mischievous glee.
"I’ve made a surprise for Madalina," he said. "I’ve promised her a surprise."
He opened the car’s hatch to reveal a baby girl goat, a goat they’d brought all the way from the village.
He put a hair ribbon over her ears. He cracked up; Liliana shook her head.
"Dad, where will we put a goat?" she asked. "On the balcony," he suggested.
Once you get an idea into his head, Liliana told me later, that’s it (My own dad’s response, on the phone that night: "Honey, if they’re giving goats as birthday presents, it’s time to come home.")
Madalina was already at the barbecue site.
The rest of us piled in the car and drove along a gravel road skirting a field, every nook occupied with barbecues in progress, a few trees giving privacy between the parties.
Our goat spoke up in protest every time the car hit a bump.
Finding Madalina, her granddad called to her to come and see this birthday surprise.
With one look, she gave a talk-to-the-hand gesture and skipped away.
"I don’t want a sheep!" she called out.
"But Mada, Mada, it’s a goat," we said.
She tiptoed back to us to reconsider. Meanwhile Liliana’s dad tied the goat to a nearby tree. The goat shouted at us, again.
Kids wandering down the gravel road stopped to check out this goat with a bow on her head; the goat created social opportunities, which Madalina could appreciate.
A whole party of goats nibbled across the open field near us.
Later, they shimmied back the way they’d come, Madalina’s goat eyeing her kin.
At the end of the day, the birthday goat rode back to the village, where it now lives happily with its goat friends, waiting for Madalina’s visit.
Nicole Sheets is a Barboursville native and Peace Corps volunteer in Moldova. Her e-mail address is moldovanicole@yahoo.com.
