This year I had my best birthday yet. I have officially reached the mid-30s and I feel comfortable with myself, where I am , whom I am with and with the idea of where I want to be. I wish I knew this would happen when I was going through my tough-20s.

Celebrations started on Friday with a party at home. Had 20 of my friends home. Aj's Nigerian friend's wife baked me this cake and I had ordered another cake myself. Core menu was made of a tabouleh with pitta bread amd hummus, mozzarella-avocado-tomato with pesto salad, Aj made his famous jerk chicken and then there were various other nibbles. We went through 8 bottles of wine, 4 bottles of prosecco and bits of various types of liquers. By the time the last guest left it was 2 am and I was TIRED!

What I totally loved about the party was that my friends came from 12 different countries and 8-9 different professional backgrounds. This is important for me because when I was training to be a doctor and then a psychiatrist my biggest fear was that I would have friends from mainly medicne and the health sector. Medicine did not fulfill my curiosity about the world and the way it functions, or about the way people lived, made choices and dealt with challenges. So this party symbolised my network of friends with whom I can have a chat, or argue or get drunk with or ponder about - dance, economics, psychology, public health, media, war, sociology and humaniatrian work, among other things. I feel blessed to be in this situation and for being in London.

Had a super chilled out weekend. I read random stuff, heard random radio and ate left overs.

Aj and I then went for a mini shopping spree yesterday. I bought 2 pairs of jeans for £25 ( Uniqlo totally rocks) and 3 CDs. The music rocks. All of them come highly recommended:
- Mayra Andrade
- Pink Martini
- Amadou & Mariam

Today my sister bought me a lovely Esprit t-shirt and we had a vegetarian lunch at Govinda - a Hare Rama Hare Krishna enterprise. Aj had booked a table for dinner a Ottolenghi in Islington. It was lovely place, with the right ambience and exotic food. 

Had all friends and family call from various parts of the world, got a book, and greeting cards too. I got a blast-from-the-past kinda phonecall from my first ex-BF today, who decided to call me after 14-15 years! I don't how he got my number in the first place. Anyway, that is post by itself. But man, was it weird. Aj had a good laugh. Sigh.

What a lovely few days I had. Aj knows me well- I don't like mushy b'day cards so he got me a one of a kind Arsenal musical birthday card. Open the card and the Arsenal club anthem plays out- woohoo! Have 10 mins of b'day left and hofefully I would've published this post.

I leave you with two of my favorite songs from the albums I bought yesterday. What do you think of the music?

Senegal fast-food by Amdou and Mariam  

Hey Eugene by Pink Martini