happee sanksgiveeng

or so the french might say. all this week ive been teaching about thanksgiving, sharing a bit of the history as well as recipes and pasttimes. researching for the history was actually quite informative, as i learned how turkeys came to be the main dish of choice(abraham lincoln sent them to soldiers in 1863 since they could feed more than a chicken could), how the 4th thursday in november was declared as the official date(originally the last thursday via george washington in 1789, moved to the penultimate by FDR in 1939 to prolong the Christmas shopping season and thereby stimulate the economy out of the great depression, and written into law as a compromise in 1941), and i learned that 45 million turkeys were consumed in 2003 on this one day.

i found that most students knew very little, maybe just the turkey bit, and didnt even know what a cranberry was in french. a neat aspect of this lesson was discussing Thanksgiving and multiculturalism, as a lot of the students come from other countries and backgrounds. one class today is mostly portugese, and quite proud of it. i have students from mauritius, guadeloupe, turkey, africa, middle east, asia, etc. and as i learned thanks to wikipedia, transplanted families often take up the traditional meal but with their own variations--italians may eat pasta, prime rib for the irish, etc. one variation that seems completely bizarre is a Cajun dish known as "Turducken". according to wikipedia and the salmon family website, turducken is a turkey stuffed with a duck stuffed with a chicken. check out the site if you're at all unclear. The Salmon family says its superior, but im not sure i want to break with tradition to try it.

last night i prepared sweet potato casserole à la Suzanne Levine. i was able to find the potatoes at my saturday market just behind my house, and the casserole seems to resemble my mother's. the proof is in the pudding, of course, so tonight at 7 we'll know how i did. i'll be sharing thanksgiving with some American friends as well as international friends. i think we'll be eating chicken rather than turkey, but as they served turkey at the cafeteria today, i got my bases covered. it should be neat to see what our brazilian, senegalese, singaporean, and dutch friends think of the meal. i'll be preparing the sweet potatoes again for a meal saturday night at the house of my pastor and his wife, which will again be a mélange of people.

as this day marks the official start of the Christmas season, tomorrow the lights on the Champs Elysées will be turned on, an event i may attend. and of course Christmas music and movies are now all fair game. the girls i lived with for 3 weeks before i found my place were hankering to start the Christmas music in October, to which i protested and they conceded when i wasnt around.

speaking of finding my own place, i had a housewarming party tuesday night which was a dashing success. about 20 other assistants and Fulbrights came over with wine in tow to toast my new apartment. my French roommates were there and had a really great time, so we've decided to have a big party in december and to invite each of our friends for a multi-lingual fete. i successfully made my own guacamole, and the Mayfield 17 boys would be glad to know i used Trends 1 for the music. housewarming in French is "pendaison de crémaillère" (literally hanging of the chimney hook), fyi.

the bell just rang for my next and final class, but i hope everyone has a very happy thanksgiving. enjoy the break and each other.

my home to yours

blogger ate my post

let's try this again.

i went out of town this past weekend, as i'm on a 2-week vacation. lille, in the north of france, was the destination, for a couple of reasons. firstly, it's a notable city and i thought deserved my attention; secondly, it's now hosting lille 3000, an Indian culture festival with art exposes and such throughout the city. actually, i thought that i'd be eating lots of indian food and people would be parading through the streets. the festival consisted largely, however, of visiting a couple different Indian art exhibitions, taking my picture with one of many large elephants lining the main drag, and sipping free chai as i watched an Indian theatrical spectacle on a large screen outside of the Opera house.

also of interest was a fine meal saturday night wherein the main course was kangaroo. it was really quite delicious. they suggested cooking it like i like my beef cooked, so i had it "bloody", as the word translates from french.

sunday morning i aimed to go to the american church in Lille, but when i showed up at 1030 no one was there. so i went to a french church instead. as i was sitting in what i thought was the 2nd service, i realized that the time had changed in france as well as in the states, and i was sitting in on the end of the 1st service, the time change also explaining why i missed the american church. but i was really glad i missed the american church and went to the french church instead, as i met a student named Dieudonne, literally God-given, and he was very welcoming. and as a result of standing next to him, all the people who greeted him also greeted me, and often with a couple kisses. perhaps you could call them "holy kisses".

sunday included a lively market, a visit to a big park complete with zoo, the american church's evening service, and dinner with friends from Paris. then monday, instead of spending the entirety of the day in Lille and returning to Paris at night, i went to Amiens, site of the largest gothic building in all of France as well as a series of canals winding amongst gardens. the church was nice, but i entirely preferred the punt ride on the canals--the fall colors were breathtaking.

back in paris, i celebrated halloween first with dinner with friends from church, then i went out with assistant friends. my costume was a frenchman, for lack of a better idea--i bought a horizontal striped blue and white shirt, a beret, a baguette, and i drew a mustache. turns out none of the french people at the party we attended were in costume, but they gestured to mine with a smile. though the party (on a boat) started at midnight, we were too late to take the metro and it took quite some time to walk to the party. we arrived at 230, entered the party around 3, and left at 6. it was early/late enough for the metro to be running, thankfully, as i basically would have refused to walk back home.

today i visited the Pere Lachaise cemetery, home to Chopin, Bizet, Jim Morrison, Gertrude Stein, Oscar Wilde, and others. tomorrow i head for Bordeaux for a couple days/nights, then back to Paris before school resumes next week.

please check out my photos from the trip here