How We Tried to Surprise Our Boss on her Birthday

It was my supervisor’s birthday last Friday, so I emailed this to her.

She sits right next to me, so I heard her laugh.

The day before, my team mate and I had talked about getting her a cake.

Hari: I will buy the cake at CCP. What does she like?
Me: She seems to like chocolate. She’s always eating it. In fact she’s eating it right now.
Hari: What are you, her stalker??
Me: No! She offered it to me!

After 10 minutes…

Me: She really likes the Lego Movie! Get her a lego cake. Stat.
Hari: Where would I find one???

And that was why on Friday after lunch, Hari walked over to me and handed me a lego set in a box. “What am I supposed to do with this?” I asked, perplexed.

“I dunno, maybe you can assemble it and put on top of the cake,” he suggested.

“I don’t know if I can do this,” I protested.

“It’s for ages 6-12! I’m sure you can handle it!”

“Ummm… I’d rather not embarrass myself.” 😮

“Then give it to the expert, then.”

“Who?”

“The birthday girl!”

So we decided to wrap up the lego set. We had no wrappers, so I used some paper and asked everyone to sign on it.

Much later on, we were on IM again.

Me: So what’s the plan, Stan? 
Hari: 5 pm, can? So we can have chips as well.
Me: Ok, you guys proceed to the pantry at 4:55 to grab some chips and wine. When you’re good, send me a morse code so I can tie her up and bring her to the place.
Hari: Haha, sounds like a plan, Dan.
Me: Ooooooor! She gets a call at 5pm from someone saying that she has a package outside the gantry. She goes and finds a package for her. When she opens it, there is a note inside, saying, “meet us at the pantry.”

At this point, Hari lost it and started laughing out loud. But he agreed it was a good idea.

Hari: But who’s gonna call her? She knows all our voices.
Me: Alvin? (his best friend in the office)
Hari: I was thinking the same thing! I’ll ask him later.

Later…

Hari: He has agreed to do it. I think he’s too into it, though. He kept asking, “so I’ll say package, right, not note?” And I told him, “you’re not gonna win an Oscar for this, okay?”
Me: Yay, Alvin! Ok, I’ll get to work on the package.

And so I did, and this was what I came up with.

At around 4:30 pm, Hari informed all our team mates about our plan. But while the first batch was in the pantry, one of Camille’s friends showed up and said she needed help with something and was all but pulling her out of her chair.

Me: Dammit. I think Camille’s friends also have a surprise for her.
Raw: If they also go to the pantry and see Hari there…
Gopi: We are screwed.

So we were not able to pull off our plan. We joined forces with her friends instead.

We still gave her the package and explained what was supposed to have happened. Then we ate cake and toasted to her birthday before heading back to our desks.

Then I had this IM conversation with Alvin.

Me: Hey I’m so sorry you didn’t get to pull off your performance.
Alvin: Haha it’s okay, it’s not as if i’m gunning for best voice actor award or something. But kudos to you all for the celebration for her.  
Me: I feel bad for you coz Hari said you were all excited for it. 
Alvin: Hahaha OMG that idiot. 
Me: And that you had prepared and internalised and all.
Alvin: Hahaha I was thinking which company to pick for the “delivery.” Fedex? UPS? DHL? Lol. 
Me: OMG you really did internalise. 😮

I copied and pasted this conversation for Hari to read, to which he replied:

Hari: LOL! He just pasted the exact same thing too!
Me: Looks like we think alive. We should be best friends. Sorry, homie, but we’re kicking you out.
Hari: Damn. Oh well. But people are always saying that he’s the Chinese version of me or I’m the Indian version of him.
Me: Then maybe I’m the Filipino female version of you both.

So even though our plans did not work out, it’s okay because we got a lot of laughs out of it, and the birthday girl had fun! 😀