It's Always a Good Time: Birthdays with Friends

You cannot choose your family but you can definitely pick your friends. Well, it didn't go that way for me at all. I was among the transferred students in the new public school in the district. We were already on our senior year and honestly there was not really any particular reason for us to transfer, well, it maybe due to how close our houses were to the school and there were teachers to spare, sort of.

Hence, it was not surprising to see familiar faces or even come across old classmate and friends. But the friends I made then were the ones I did not even spare a passing glance before! Now, it's been a decade and I'm still amazed that we are as close as we were then. Never have I imagined that we'd end up being friends  at all. With the years after our high school graduation, we made it a point to hang out as often as we can. And what better way to do so than during someone's birthday? Can you imagine how many birthdays we've celebrated already?!

Just us girls! 2014. Photo by Anna Peñaranda

But now that I think about it, none of my close friends really like the glitzy sort of birthdays and more often than not we just chill out at someone's house, eat whatsoever is prepared, drink, hang-out with their families, chika to the max or sometimes just watch movies while drinking. It was no different on how we chill-out on regular days though, (albeit the pulutan is varied and way tastier!). Really, it just comes down to the effort we make to be there on one's birthday regardless of all our personal sh*t.

during Jean T.'s birthday 2014  Photo by Pes

Mind you, we were barely getting started. (c) Samot 2015

When we were younger, we usually have our own celebrations, of which are just for friends. It was like an understood thing for all of us and we preferred it that way since it meant intimate and comfortable.

after Jean T's birthday celebration 2015; (c) Samot

But now, we've learned to celebrate with other people. We met and created new relationships with other people as we got older, so its quite inevitable to have them celebrate birthdays with us. We can't very well monopolize our friends' time.

during Meng's birthday Feb. 2016

Initially, it took some time getting used to, especially for me as I am probably the pickiest and "easily annoyed" in the group, hehe. But it was a good change for us as we were then able to create more memories, meet new faces and build new friendships.

In the meantime, say cheese! (c) Samot 2015

Some of us have families now, in a serious relationship and some are just biding their time. Regardless of the changes in our personal lives, we continue having get-together on birthdays, even if its just a simple dinner or a feast, regardless if one was early or a tad late; bearing gifts or not; the only thing that really matters is we were there to celebrate and create new memories, stories that we'll then talk about on the next birthday.