Giant Pandas Celebrate Their Birthdays Around the World

Giant Pandas from around the world celebrated birthdays on August 8 with their favorite treats. At the Ouwehands Zoo in the central Dutch town of Rhenen, male Xing Ya and female Wu Wen celebrated their fourth birthdays with a special three-tiered “ice-cream cake.” Xing Ya was the only one to show up at the party. His cake consisted of several layers of ice with beetroot, carrots and apples. The top layer was decorated with four candles made of bamboo and carrot.

Xing Ya was born on August 5th and Wu Wen on August 11th so the zoo split the difference and decided to celebrate their birthdays together on the eighth day of the eighth month for good luck. The number eight is a lucky number in Chinese culture as the two concentric circles resembles their “double happiness” character.

In the video taken by Reuters, Xing Ya can be seen ambling over to the luscious gift filled with panda goodies of fruits and veggies supported by bamboo shoots, which make up 99% of their diet.

At one point, Xing Ya is very pleased with himself for discovering a rogue apple and plops down next to the cake to devour it.

Finally, after he succeeds in toppling the cake and separating the tiers, he nonchalantly walks away from his cake which probably took humans hours to create.

Meanwhile in Vienna, panda twins Fu Ban and Fu Feng — the top attractions at the Tiergarten Schoenbrunn Zoo — celebrated their first birthday with pink and blue boxes filled with bamboo, sweet potatoes and carrots. When they were born on August 7, 2016, the zoo held a contest to name them.  The male Fu Ban which means “happy companion, happy half” in Chinese, was the only one to show up at the party so he got his pick of the presents. His sister Fu Feng aka “phoenix” is said to be very shy and more comfortable inside away from people.

Looks like Fu Ban had more fun rolling around the boxes than opening them.

The siblings have grown almost twice as much since their birth, according to Zookeeper Renate Haider. Fu Feng weighed in at 20 pounds when she was born and now weighs 48 pounds, while brother Fu Ban who weighed 15 pounds now weighs 39 pounds.

Giant Panda birthdays are something to celebrate as they were once considered an endangered species, but no longer. Happy Birthday to the Giant Pandas, and many more.