Thursday 24 November 2011

Thanksgiving : a long way from home

Pumpkin pie. They say you either love it or hate it. When I was a kid, I remember distinctly not liking it. But as I’ve gotten old, and the US has grown further away as I implant myself more and more in France, I look forward to my annual pumpkin pie. Weird.  

So as Thanksgiving approaches, and I began planning my now annual Thanksgiving extravaganza where 30+ Franco-Americans embark on my still unfinished house, I felt like an old pro. I knew where to get the turkeys and once again called the Ferme Avicole Bauduin in Rosult, I was able to get fresh cranberries via a German collegue, dried cranberries at Carrefour and cornmeal at the organic store (thanks to all the gluten free baking I’ve been doing recently). And, I even delegated more than usual. I am trying NOT to bake a pie, but I’m not sure I can hold out…

Yesterday I baked 4 dozen mini pumpkin-cornmeal muffins (a mash up of the Joy of Cooking's pumpkin bread and Brooke Dojny's Shaker Corn Pumpkin bread) to bring to school and the crèche so my kids have some sense that it’s a special day.

This morning, I accompanied my 5 year old to school where I explained Thanksgiving to her class in a way that avoided religion and colonial power and God (there’s a Jehovah’s Witness in the class who has been innocently indoctrinating the other kids about God watching them from his perch in the sky). I told them that a long time ago, before planes, the English came to America and met the Native Americans. The English found new food they didn’t know about and celebrated with the Native Americans. So today in the US, it’s a holiday where people eat pumpkin, cranberries and turkey. The kids devoured the muffins and dried cranberries; and the brave few even ate some raw cranberries. There were some interesting questions like: did the English sleep on the boat? Did they eat fish? Why didn’t they take a plane? And then, P (who happens to be very sweet but is the class menace) said “it must take you a long time to get to school from your house since it’s so far away.” And it made me realize that home really is where the heart is...

Happy Thanksgiving to all!







 

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

And Happy Thanksgiving to all the Franco-Americans especially Max and Suzanne. Enjoy that pumpkin pie. BTW, unfortunately God did have something to do with the first Thanksgiving as the Pilgrims were Bible reading peole. They most likely were inspired by the Biblical holiday of Sukkot, a day of thanksgiving and gathering in the crops.

Grandma

Reb said...

yeah yeah, but try telling that to a bunch of 5 year olds while translating a book from English to French.

puppyfur said...

As an American living in Ireland and about to move to France, I am thankful for your blog. Happy Thanksgiving!

Reb said...

thanks puppyfur! good luck with your move to France!

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...