Photo Credit: O. Heffernan

People sang "Happy Birthday" (in English). Others applauded. Japan's Environment Minister cut a six-foot high, three-tier birthday cake adorned with palm trees, miniature wind turbines, and Balinese huts.

But if the Kyoto Protocol were a child, he would have had very little to celebrate on his tenth birthday today. The party was just a way for his dysfunctional family to take a few minutes off from their squabbling.

Let's take a brief look at Kyoto's kin and why I wouldn't wish this 10th birthday on anyone:

• All day long, his entire family (190 nations) has been arguing with increasing anger and frustration. Remind you of your own family get-togethers?
• His favorite uncles and aunts, the European Union, who have supported him the most throughout the years, are spending his birthday trying to create a replacement for him in Bali
• His richest uncle, the United States, refuses to give up any of its prosperity in order to help him mature and make something of himself, when in fact he might be able to support Kyoto without nearly as much economic harm as he thinks
• Even his birth-parents, the Japanese (he was born in Kyoto, after all), are admitting he didn't come out quite as planned: "The Kyoto Protocol targets are proving to be difficult to achieve not only for Japan, for other countries as well." - Ichiro Kamoshita, Japan's Environment minister
• Imagine being told unprovoked by your parents that you are "difficult" on your birthday: "It's only 10 years old...and we have worked hard to raise a child. Still, at the age of 10, children can be quite difficult, and so the Kyoto Protocol too," - again, Ichiro Kamoshita, Japan's Environment minister
• Already, very few family members believe in him. As Kimiko Hirata of the Kiko Network, a Japanese NGO put it, "The spirit of Kyoto is dying" (Nature)

So what was Kyoto's birthday wish?

He would never tell, of course, but I'll venture a guess. Here's what Kyoto might wish for:

Please, before I expire in 2012 [morbid, I know], let me show that I can make a difference, that international cooperation on climate change is not irrelevant, and that my younger, hopefully much stronger brother is born after Bali with my whole family's blessing.

But even Kyoto knows that this is wishful thinking. If I were him I would run away from home.