Basically, you eat more than you should with a house filled with more people than it fits by normal standards and watch American football with more dedication than is shown at other times of the year. As for what exactly we eat, there is a trend of soft and mushy, which decreases time spent chewing meaning we can stuff in more food before our bellies notice and start begging us to stop. It's really all just a race against your hypothalamus. These foods include mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, green bean casserole, stuffing, pumpkin pie, apple pie and of course the big ol' butter ball himself, The Thanksgiving Turkey. I understand that turkey isn't quite a mushy food, but after the amounts of gravy I typically add to it, you find it slides down quite easily. This list is not exclusive by any means, but it covers the basics. All this gorging often induces food comas and then leads to lots of napping and lounging.
Now the second point in my explanation was that you need a very full house, preferably filed with lots of people you love. For me, this always meant having a bustling crowd of grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins with the smallest children often placed at hastily errected card tables scattered across the house with paper turkey centerpieces. Add a barking dog or two to the mix, and perfection is near at hand.
The last piece is one that I don't find to be critical for anything but traditions sake and that is watching Thanksgiving day football. The interested members of the family gather around the fernseher and watch our valiant Lions fight to (unfortunately) most likely a loss, though if we are with my mom's family then we will also tune in to the Packers game and so there is a chance of a win there.
The challenge that I set myself for this year, was to make the most authentic Thanksgiving I could while here in German. Now a few problems faced me, like where to buy a turkey, and how to stuff my house to the brim with people I loved. Football was one problem I decided to sacrifice in the name of simplicity. I talked to my host parents about the turkey issue and after a few different searches, we found that the local super market actually carried turkeys of consideraable size. The American expat community is strong enough here that turkeys are stocked for the holiday seasons, making one problem disappear quickly. Now that we had two 5 kilo birds to stuff, where were we going to find a large group of loving individuals to stuff the house with? You guessed it, all the American rotary exchange students, that's who!
My poor, sweet host parents didn't quite know what they were agreeing to I fear when I asked if we could house these American vagabonds for a day of thankful feasting. Bless their big welcoming hearts, they handled the hectic day with grace and poise and didn't back down from the challenge I built for them. 14 teenagers filled our cozy home which had under gone some remodeling to add a long folding table and two benches across the living room to accomadate everyone. My host dad made multiple trips to the train station to pick up our pot and pan totting pilgrims that had ridden on buses and trains for up to 2 hours to reach us. All the classic foods were there and with hearts full of exchange student love we all ate more than might be reccomended but we didn't forget to give thanks for all the blessings we had in our lives. Going around the tables, we all took time to remember why we were there and who had helped us reach that point. Many of us had similar things to be thankful for this year and I think the main things for me are covered in this list:
1. My family for enabling my exchange.
2. Rotary for building such an amazing program and sponsoring me.
3. My friends back in Michigan who have supported me from over 4,000 miles away.
4. My host family for taking me in as one of their own.
5. All the exchange students who have acted as my adopted extended family.
6. All the Germans who have shown such kindness to this often confused little Ami.
7. God for listening when nobody else could and guiding me through this year.
8. The lessons I have learned in these last 4 months about myself and the ways of the world.
It was a wonderful day to reflect on the last 4 months and to look ahead to all the adventures that await us still. This spirit was all covered in a video that a good friend made where we all recorded our thanks and our dreams for the year. I really hope I can figure out how to upload videos by the time I get a copy of the video as I am sure it'll be a wonderful snapshot of exchange life to share with you all. Until then,
Liebe Grüße
~M
*"my research" is actually just some vague memory from something once read and a pinch of critical thinking so here's to hoping I'm right.
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