Today is R's dad's birthday party, though it was his actual birthday earlier this week. So I would first like to wish him a heartfelt congratulations on his birthday!


This leads me to a story about his actual birthday,  where I committed a faux pas for his dad's birthday. R sent me a wonderful link which includes lists upon lists about Dutch culture, including Dutch Birthdays, however he sent it to me the next day... I have found these to be hilarious and relevant in my two first weeks here, and will endeavour to talk about them, as well as Stuff Dutch People Like in the next little while. They're both hilarious and also quite topical.

When we arrived at his parents house, I greeted everyone and specifically went to say hello and congratulations to R's dad. I knew that rather than wishing someone a 'happy birthday,' you're supposed to congratulate them on their birthday. Which seems strange to me. Really, if you're going to congratulation someone about a birthday, it should be a person's mother! She did all the work!

However, what I failed to do was to also congratulate R's mom on his dad's birthday. I will draw your attention to #3 on the Five rules for dealing with Dutch birthdays.

3. If it is your partner or child’s birthday, you must congratulate everyone else in the family. This might sound odd. It goes like this. It is your husband’s birthday. You invite his mother for coffee and cake. She says to you “Congratulations on Fred’s birthday”, you say to her: “Congratulations on your son’s birthday”. You congratulate Fred’s sister on her brother’s birthday and so on. Seriously. You do.

 This seems to me as though it could be a very long winded "conversation"of only congratulations!

Update 9/9/2013 - I congratulated at least 50 people on R's dad's birthday. Most of the conversations went like this (but in Dutch). "Hi, I'm Lyndsey, R's girlfriend. Congratulations on his dad's birthday. Nice to meet you."