We just turned 14!
This month Cultural Mixology turned 14. Wow, time flies! We are truly grateful to have spent the past 14 years serving as a strategic thinking partner to support individuals and organizations that want to thrive across cultures.
Of course, our 14th birthday is a great time to reflect on how #culturematters when it comes to birthdays and related milestones. For example, did you know that Japanese culture recognizes several important events during a child’s first year of life? One of them is Okuizome (お食い初め), a celebratory meal prepared around the baby’s 100th day of life and presented to them as their “first meal”. In contrast, other cultures do not put much emphasis on birthdays. In Bhutan, for example, individual birthdays are not celebrated and many people don’t even know their actual birthday. For administrative purposes, the entire country turns one year older on January 1st.
Different Ways to Say Happy Birthday
In honor of our 14th birthday, we’d like to share 14 different ways to express “Happy Birthday!” Some cultures swap out the literal “happy birthday” for an expression like “congratulations” or “many good wishes”:
- Swedish: Grattis på födelsedagen
- Portuguese: parabéns or feliz aniversário
- Somali: dhalasho Wacan
- Dutch: Gefeliciteerd or Gelukkige verjaardag
- Nepali: Janmadinakō
- Russian: С Днём рождения (s dnyem rozhdeniya)
- Italian: tanti auguri or buon compleanno
- German: Alles Gute zum Geburtstag or Fröhliche Geburtstag or Herzlichen Glückwunsch zum Geburtstag
- Turkish: doğum günün kutlu olsun
- Hebrew: יום הולדת שמח (yom huledet sameach)
- Tagalog: maligayang kaarawan
- Mandarin: 生日快乐! (sheng ri kuai le)
- Cantonese: 生日快樂! (saang yat faai lok)
- Hindi / Bangla: जन्मदिन की हार्दिक शुभकामनाएँ / জন্মদিন এর প্রীতি ও শুভেচ্ছা
If you’d like to add another language to the list (we plan to be around for a while! 😉), please reach out and share with us. Thank you for 14 years of cross-cultural connections, learning, growth, and support!
