A Chiri Thanksgiving - by Jessie

Despite the fact that American “Thanksgiving” is not a recognized holiday in Ethiopia, the American volunteers at Lalmba decided to have a thoroughly American Thanksgiving meal. Or, at least that was the plan until we realized that an eight kilo turkey would cost $85. We settled for a Thanksgiving chicken instead. We did get a big juicy undoubtedly hormone-plumped chicken though, instead of one of the tiny athletic Ethiopian chickens. We pretty much pretended the chicken was a turkey though, stuffing its little body with dressing and using the neck and the gizzard to make gravy (that was not my contribution; the program director’s wife was visiting, and she is fortunately quite a cook-from-scratch cook with quite a few Thanksgiving dinners under her belt!). We made mashed potatoes and cooked fresh green beans. Emily made a pumpkin pie from a real pumpkin, and cooked the extra pumpkin like squash. We drank wine from a box. We talked about the things for which we are thankful. It was almost perfect.

Almost perfect, except it wasn’t my grandma’s turkey and stuffing. Almost perfect, because even homemade-from-fresh pumpkin pie isn’t quite as good as the French Silk pie that my Aunt Patty brings from Baker’s Square every year. Almost perfect, except that I didn’t get to witness my brother’s girlfriend “meeting the family,” or see my two-year-old niece experience her first Thanksgiving with teeth, and I didn’t have the luxury of celebrating vegetarian Thanksgiving with my also-vegetarian sister-in-law. Almost perfect, except I didn’t get to see Edwin and his dad deep-fry an entire turkey in that terrible garage deep-fryer that could burn down the house or clog your arteries in about ten minutes. So, while our Chiri Thanksgiving was almost perfect … I must admit that some holidays just can’t be reproduced overseas.