Happy Birthday Chris and Why I *might* just move to Burundi

This weekend a bunch of our friends got together at our place to toast our dear friend, Chris. You can see him in these pictures dancing with girls (quite out of character, actually) and cooking rabbits in our fireplace.

Chris is a chef. He is a better cook than pretty much anyone I know. He offerred to do all of the cooking for his birthday party (except for dessert which I took care of). So, we had: rabbits (cooked in the fireplace), squash gnocchi (to die for), antipasti, pickled onion and bean salad, home made Italian bread, and LOTS of wine. LOTS and LOTS of really great wine. And martinis. And I was not about to be outdone. We actually had more food for dessert than for the actual supper. I made a quadruple batch of chocolate cinnamon fondue, pound cake, candied grapefruit, pommelo, tangerine, and orange peels, coconut macaroons, meringues, home made marshmallows, and tons of other fruit.

All in all, in the words of one of the guests, it was totally a "Roman" affair of utter decadence. Someone asked me at some point in the evening where the vomitorium was.

The best part about the whole affair was getting to see some dear friends, Aline and Bruno, who live in Toronto but were in town to visit. An added bonus was Aline's sisters, Nadine and Claudette, coming, along with our friend, Mary, and then Chris' brother Rick who is too busy with the DNP to usually give us the time of day. :-) And EVERYONE danced. Chris made a mixed CD called "80's Fromage" i.e. 80's cheese for you non-French speakers which was stuffed full of great stuff like Prince, David Bowie, the Eurythmics, etc, etc. And at any point in the evening you could hear a minimum of three languages being spoken.

I have to say that it was in my top five best times ever right up there with my trips to France and Hawaii and even my wedding. It was so good to see these people, it was great to eat this food and drink the amazing wines, it was wonderful and made me feel so great that everyone was dancing and having a good time. It was a celebration of life and pretty much everything good, making it a perfect acknowledgement of Chris' birthday and getting to see all of our friends. People even helped do the dishes.

Aline, Claudette, and Nadine are actually from Burundi. For those of you who have never heard of this country, it is in Africa. Think Hotel Rwanda, and that's pretty much Burundi. The whole Tutsi-Hutu thing. Actually, that's the whole reason why the girls are in the states. They escaped a lot of the fighting and genocide in their country and are now refugees here. In this case this United States wins because I LOVE these girls. They are so fun, loving, and stylish, which brings me to my second point.

All the girls were sitting around talking fashion. We were chatting about different body types. Now, Nadine and Claudette have the body I would DIE to have--tall, slim, no fat, not many curves. But they were saying how they wanted MY body and how in their country no one will even look at them because they think they have AIDS or some other disease. On the other hand, a woman with curves but who still has a waist is "cherished" in their words. According to them, my body type is like goddess status in Burundi.

This all sounds like complete insanity to me, but whatever. It is nice to think that some culture out there doesn't find my body type completely repulsive.

Then the girls were all trying to tell me that I should buy and wear "skinny" jeans so as to emphasize my butt more and also draw attention to my great "thick" thighs. Seriously. They were in all sincerity saying these things. They want thick thighs and a huge ass. I CANNOT comprehend this AT ALL, but they are saying these things. I could say nothing. I was in shock. I did manage to eek out that I will never wear skinny, high waisted jeans again. Then they started to try to convince me to buy Gitano jeans (are they kidding??????? I was wearing those about 13 years ago.....)

Maybe I should move to Burundi.