surprise birthday event
- noun
:
fiesta de cumpleaños sorpresa
- Last night, we celebrated a surprise birthday event for my sister, complete with decorations and her favorite cake.
Examples
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We threw a surprise birthday event for our manager at the office last Friday.
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He walked in and was genuinely shocked by the surprise birthday event his friends had arranged.
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Planning a surprise birthday event requires careful coordination with all the guests.
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We organized a surprise birthday event for Sarah.
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Did you plan a surprise birthday event for him?
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He was overwhelmed with joy when he walked in on the surprise birthday event his family had planned for him.
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To keep it a secret, everyone worked together to plan the surprise birthday event for their friend's special day.
How Surprising
201
1.0
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is directly and transparently built from the constituents: an 'event' for a 'birthday' that is a 'surprise' (unexpected). This straightforward compositional structure is cross-linguistically common, so a B1 learner who knows the component words would readily infer the intended meaning.
Etymology
The noun surprise birthday event comes from the simple image of friends hiding and quietly getting ready for a birthday event, then suddenly shouting surprise when the person arrives. That's why it means 'a birthday celebration secretly organized to surprise the person'.