SURPRISE!

Yesterday (Saturday) was my good friend Mala's Baby Shower. Mala used to work in the Marketing Department with me as our graphic designer but left in December to work for another company. I really miss seeing her every day. It's hard trying to be friends with someone while you're working with them, but Mala and I really bonded through both being born and brought up in another county (there's no better way to have fun than to gripe about Americans with another expat - sorry folks, but it's true!)

Mala's baby, Evani (isn't that a beautiful name?) is due on March 3, and Joy (another good friend of mine who works with me) organized a surprise baby shower at Mala's best-friend, Sanhita Bandyopadhyay's house. I just had to put Sanhita's last name in there - it's a fantastic tongue twister.

As you can see, Mala was suitably surprised. Her husband, Shomeek (behind her in the picture) was the one who had to load her in the car and get her to Sanhita's house for a casual "just because" lunch - something for which it sounds like he deserves a medal! Having been the victim of a surprise Bachelorette party last year, I can sympathize. There's a point in the proceedings, right as you're heading to the "fake" event, that the logic of the thing starts to unravel and suddenly you start to ask questions to which your "minder" has no answer. Why are you dressing up for this? Why aren't you dressing up? Why are we having lunch at 11:30? Why are we driving so fast? Why are we having lunch today again?

The event was also a great opportunity to catch up with employees of marketing teams past (not all of them - probably couldn't fit them in a single house).

First Photo - L to R - Megan (old Marketing Coordinator), Joy and her gorgeous daughter Noelle, Linh (old Marketing Assistant), Annette (old Marketing Assistant and other various jobs!)

Second Photo - Joe (Event Planning God - see previous posts) and Kim, my manager. Kim is also pregnant. See note below. She's going to kill me for posting this photo on the web but I think she's beautiful.

I can't wait to meet little Evani in just several short weeks!

Next week... Kim's baby-shower. Kim is due on 3/23 (although the date is the source of much debate).