Let’s all give thanks!

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow.

Melody Beattie

This Thursday, as with every fourth Thursday in November, our friends in the USA celebrate Thanksgiving. Now, we Europeans can be a little snooty when it comes to the culture and traditions of the USA, after all it only became the country we know today on July the 4th, 1776, they didn’t have the Renaissance, the Roman Empire, the Byzantine era, etc. so, how can they possibly have anything traditional to celebrate?

A few years ago I happened to be in Cleveland, Ohio over Thanksgiving, I was there on an exchange project with work so, had no family with me, just a few friends. When one of my US colleagues realised we would just be spending a regular Thursday night in the hotel we were staying in, they were having none of it and insisted we come and spent the evening with them. I can honestly say it was one of the most wonderful, most memorable, most emotional evenings I’ve ever had – I loved it and will be forever grateful!

But what exactly is Thanksgiving? This annual event is in honour of the “first” Thanksgivings in America, in 1619 in Virginia, and in 1621, when colonists in Plymouth, Massachusetts, later known as the Pilgrims, shared a meal with the Wampanoag Indians, who were native to the land. The later feast was in honour of the help the Pilgrims received from the Native Americans in cultivating crops and surviving their first harsh winter and it lasted three days!

Although Thanksgiving may originally have had religious significance, the day has become a mostly secular holiday.

Most Americans consider the holiday a day to gather and express their thanks through food, family, and football – with multiple big games being played on the holiday. During the Thanksgiving feast I attended, we were asked to write down what we were truly thankful for and then read aloud from the pieces of paper whilst we were around the table. How many times do we actually take a step back from our hectic lives to think about what makes us happy, what we’re grateful for?

Over the years the festival has evolved, some people claiming it’s just become another commercial excuse to spend cash, that wasn’t my experience and actually, the sentiment is still as strong and relevant today as it was in the seventeenth century! One of the most spectacular events is the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City. The world’s largest Thanksgiving parade includes giant balloons of cartoons that float above the city sky, as well as marching bands and dancers.

The biggest thing about Thanksgiving is the feast, traditionally celebrated with family and friends. In the USA, turkeys are an integral part of Thanksgiving Day, with most dinners including the bird. An estimated 46m turkeys are enjoyed annually for the holiday however, in a fabulous quirk, one turkey is pardoned each year by the president. It’s not only about the Turkey though, the majority of the dishes in the traditional Thanksgiving dinner are made from foods native to the New World, as according to tradition the Pilgrims received these foods, or learned how to grow them, from the Native Americans. No menu would be complete without, Cranberry Sauce, Green Beans, Brussels Sprouts, Sweet Potatoes, extra fully Mashed Potatoes and of course to round it all off, a rich Pumpkin or Pecan pie!

Of course, other countries have their own Thanksgiving celebrations, Canada celebrates their own Thanksgiving on the second Monday of October.

Having sampled the hospitality, the friendship, the joy and the humility of a traditional Thanksgiving, I can tell you that it’s not only a tradition in every sense of the word, it’s a tradition our American friends should be truly proud of, I believe every country should have a Thanksgiving day, in a world where people die every minute of every hour through poverty and starvation, I think we all need to have the opportunity to take a step back, take a look at what we have beyond the material, and be truly thankful for what we have.

So, to all my friends in the good old United States of America – May you and your family and friends enjoy a bountiful Thanksgiving, a joyous holiday season and healthy and happy New Year!!

What’s on this week?