Delicious Irony

So, last week was Thanksgiving.  We got to celebrate it twice, once at college and once at Dr. Swanson's (my adviser) house.  The dinner at college has become a tradition, after only 1 year.  In fact, we weren't going to do it again this year, but then people who were there last year (non-Americans, mind you!) said, 'But you have to!  It's a tradition!'  Hee hee.  So, we did it again, and it was nice.

The irony was everywhere.  First of all, we were celebrating Thanksgiving, the holiday that celebrates freedom from religious persecution in England, in England.  Second, there were 40 people around our very, very long table, and only 10 of us were Americans!  It was surreal but fantastic to celebrate our quintessential American holiday with people from Swaziland, Lebanon, Russia, Canada, Scotland, England, and Ireland.

We had a craft: everyone had to make a paper hat to wear to dinner; no hat, no food!  The options were men's and women's pilgrim hats, or 'Indian' headbands with feathers.  The girls split about 50/50 between the women's pilgrim hat and the headband, whereas only 3 of the guys went for the men's pilgrim hat.  If you'd asked me beforehand, I'd have said that probably not a lot of people would get into the whole hat thing.  It's amazing what people will do, however, in the name of getting into the spirit of a holiday; plus, all those 'foreigners' ;) didn't know any better.  :D  All but one person was wearing a hat when we finally sat down to eat!

After dinner, we all watched White Christmas on a big screen.  It was a little bit of heaven for this very homesick expat.  It was funny, though, to watch it through the eyes of others.  The musical is yet another thing that is precisely American.  It requires a suspension of disbelief in a way that other film genres don't, what with the sudden bursting into song for every imaginable human emotion.  Oh well, our guests humored us, even if they don't feel the need to ever watch it again.  So that was our first Thanksgiving dinner; the second was lovely as well, but that's another story.