the anniversary of the day of your birth

In honor of Ms. Barca, today would be the perfect day to talk about birthdays in Tanzania, or the lack thereof.

Of course everyone has a birthday, for pretty obvious reasons. But historically birthdays are not celebrated here. It used to be that people wouldn’t know their birthday and some still don’t. Birth certificates are a relatively modern thing. If you think about it, if you’re born into a community, then you’re a part of that community and everyone knows that you’re a part of it. So in villages and rural areas, and even in the cities here, people are born into communities. So paper records aren’t needed since you’re known. One of coworkers said that he didn’t know his birthday until he was 10 since his dad forgot it and only his mom’s family remembered it. It is only the year that matters.

Since the day and the month aren’t crucial, no one celebrates the individual day of their birth. Everyone turns another year older on the first of the year. So if you’re born in January or in December of the same year, you’re the same age.

Which brings us to the translation of “happy birthday”. There isn’t an easy translation- the closest way would be to say “congratulations on the anniversary of the day or your birth”.

So Ms. Barca…
Hongera kwa siku ya kuzaliwa ya wewe, hongera kwa siku ya kuzaliwa ya wewe…
Hongera kwa siku ya kuzaliwa ya weeeeeeweeeeeee,
Hongera kwa siku ya kuzaliwa ya WEWE!