Okey's and Sheri's kids Chibu (left) and Chidibe (right), along with their sister Chiamaka (below, not there because she had just gone back to college - UConn at Storrs) have had many fight lessons from me, ever since they were much younger..
Finally, after exactly 3 weeks, I've received some photos of my 60th birthday dinner to share...I was invited by my longtime friend and brother Okey Ndibe and his family to their home in the pleasant community of West Hartford Connecticut to celebrate my birthday weekend. It ended up being the best birthday celebration that I've yet to have. That’s quite an accomplishment in and of itself, because my 50th birthday weekend was one of such hedonism and debauchery that it would have made the great Hugh Hefner blush
Nevertheless, on the right - above, I’m blowing out the candles on my ice cream cake. Notice that they show “40”. That was the warm surprise that the Ndibe family had for me, since I told them earlier that day I’d called my Mom, telling her that I had long been aware of the fact that she and the hospital had inflated my age by 20 years and I was now going to tell the whole world the truth. She cracked up, of course.
At the very top, is a photo of all of the wonderful people who joined me for my birthday celebration dinner, which included one of my favorite meals, Egusi soup with goat meat. On the far end of the left side of the table is Jerry Butler, a brilliant painter and art professor, his daughter Vanessa Butler, an actress and college instructor, her boyfriend Andrew Schaff, a nursing student, Sheri Ndibe, a longtime art professor and Okey’s wife. On the far end of the right side of the table sitting next to me is Dr. Evelyn Newman Phillips (anthropology), a fairly recent emigre from Kenya - Dr. Wangari Gichiru (education), and Dr. Okey Ndibe (literature). We didn't just eat delicious food and drink wine, we had several hours of sizzling intellectual discourse.
G. Djata Bumpus
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