I’ve introduced you all to my Mum before. The woman I’ve been waging emoji war with for months on end. She has even more talents than just the incomprehensible texting, I assure you.
When it comes to birthdays, Mum doesn’t muck about. Her mantra is ‘you’ve got to make sure people have something to unwrap’. She once sent 40 cards for a 40th birthday, every single one hand-made and illustrated.
My brother-in-law got a clay figurine this year. Let us hope there’s no extra meaning to the ‘concrete shoes’.
As you know, I’m in Japan now. It was my birthday recently, late July. Mum was so ready. Minor inconveniences such as distance and postage were never going to deter one so resourceful.
The arrival of ‘the box’ was still a surprise to me. I opened the door to find the DHL guy straining under the weight of a massive package. (How I wish that was a euphemism.) Not only was the box on the hefty side, it’d been parcel taped to within an inch of its life. I knew the sender before I clocked the label.
I hacked away at the tape with some trepidation. “What the bloody hell has she sent me?” kept flashing through my mind. The suspicious heaviness was a little concerning.
Mum has somehow managed to post me a whole birthday cake. Which looks like a pizza. Here it is:
A bold move! She’d opened the cake box and rammed the remaining space with polystyrene, just to be sure.
Choosing a pizza design was risky. Japan’s not keen on you bringing food in – mercifully that’s the only thing it has in common with your average cinema. Meats, fruits, vegetables and eggs are all unwise choices. The ‘pepperoni’ on the cake smells like raspberries, which must’ve been confusing.
But highly processed foods are fine, and few things come more processed than a supermarket sponge cake. The nice customs officials didn’t even open the box. I admire their self-restraint, it’s a really good cake.
Mum continues to prove that international birthday deliveries are not just a piece of cake but the whole thing. And I’ll continue to eat the whole damn thing, for as long as she’ll keep posting cake my way.
