Thanksgiving in France

Thursday was Thanksgiving back in the States, but here in France it was just another workday.  I spent the day telling my classes all about the origins of Thanksgiving, why we don't call Native Americans "Indians," the types of typical American cuisine served on Thanksgiving, how we celebrate it, that it's not a religious holiday per se, and Black Friday.  I spent 9.5 hours at my school in Beuvrages and spent 7 hours on repeat.  It was really swell, but very tiring.  Summary of my Thanksgiving lesson is this:

• In 1620 the Pilgrims came from England to America on a ship called the Mayflower and landed at Plymouth.  They came for religious freedom.
• They made friends with the Native Americans because they didn't know how to grow any crops and could not feed themselves because in 1620 there were no supermarkets or McDonald's.
• The Native Americans taught the Pilgrims how to grow crops such as corn.
• The Pilgrims were so thankful that in 1621 they threw a big party to thank the Native Americans, but also God.
• Today we celebrate Thanksgiving on the 4th Thursday of November.
• It is a holiday that is celebrated with your family, usually including extended family.
• We celebrate Thanksgiving by having a big feast that includes:
• Turkey (Dinde)
• Mashed Potatoes (Purée)
• Rice and Gravy (Riz et Jus de la Dinde)
• Corn (Maïz)
• Salad (Salade)
• Stuffing (Farce)
• Sweet Potatoes (Potates Douces)
• Cranberry Sauce (Sauce des Canneberges) - They don't have Cranberries in France so this was hard to explain
• Green Bean Casserole (Casserole des Haricots Verts)
• Apple Pie (Tarte aux Pommes)
• Pumpkin Pie (Tarte aux Citrouille)
• Pecan Pie (Tarte aux Noix de Pecan)
•  In addition to the feast, families watch football games; both college and NFL. (Explaining the differences between the two was interesting as collège in French means middle school and football means soccer.)
•  There is a parade televised from New York called Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.  Macy's is the name of the store that sponsors the parade.  The parade consists of giant balloons that resemble cartoon characters and floats.  (Explaining floats was difficult but the French word for float is "char."  Once I figured this out my lessons went much smoother.)
•  Black Friday occurs on the day after Thanksgiving.  It is a day of big sales (soldes) with huge discounts (remises).  Stores open around 5 a.m. and lines form at 2 a.m. because the biggest discounts will only be given to the first 200 people.

That doesn't seems like a lot of info, but trying to convey all of this to students with a very basic understanding of English was very...interesting.

Now although Thanksgiving was on Thursday in the States, here in France we celebrated the Saturday before Thanksgiving (Nov 20).  It was potluck so everyone had to bring something.  David and I chipped in to make a big ole salad.  In France they don't have any mega-sized serving bowls, so I bought a big blue bucket to serve it out of.  It was so super yummy, but I forgot to take pictures of it.  The party took place at Sara's, another American assistant, and she had prepared chickens because turkey is only eaten in France around Christmas.  There was also green bean casserole, sweet potatoes, potatoes au gratin, mashed potatoes, quiche, cheesecake, chocolate cake, and apple crumble.  The meal was so delicious and super filling.

We started the meal at 3pm and I started drinking wine with my meal.  If you know anything about drinking that if you start drinking it pretty much means you have to keep drinking if you want to get drunk and keep your drunk.  So I kept drinking.  There was a big lull after the meal when a lot of the people from the meal left before the party started that evening.  I wanted to nap, but knew that would have been a terrible idea.  So instead we went on a hunt for large plastic cups and ping pong balls so that we could play beer pong.  Success!  I played my first game of beer pong in about 6 years, and it was also probably only the second time I've ever played.  It was super fun and Shelby, and I didn't lose by too much.

Shortly thereafter there was more beer drinking, wine drinking, more food was served (as in the French tradition to continually serve food throughout a party).  A bunch of us retreated up to Sara's room and chatted and had a mini dance party.  We then decided we needed to bring the party downstairs.  All of us in our American glory descended the stairs and entered the living room and turned what was a casual hang out into a dance party. Go us!  We turned the lights off and the party was hopping.

The next several hours are very blurry, but I do know that I tried to play matchmaker for David and ended up spending a good long while talking to this girl in French about how nice David is and how she should be interested.  Then there were fries.  Then somehow I got into a deep conversation with the French girl about how Americans have a perception of how all French people are lovers and how Americans don't know anything because they are too culturally absorbed (present company excluded of course).  That was a disaster of a conversation.  Most people can speak French better the drunker they get.  I think I discovered that the drunker I get, and the more I speak French, the more I use up the French in my head, and then by the end of the night I can barely form a sentence.

More beer and some dirty dancing later and somehow it was 4:30 in the morning and time to call it a night.  But hot damn!  That party was a freaking blast!  I have to say my French Thanksgiving was pretty damn epic.
A few pictures courtesy of Sara:

Allison, Tristen, Myself, Joey (over my shoulder), and David

The Famed Beer Pong.  Did I mention that Allison is a beer pong beast?  Cuz she is.

Sara, Myself, and BEER

Dance party upstairs.  Tristen, Shelby's back, Me (doing something me-like)

Turkeys, Teaching, and Thanksgiving

Update on life:

Really starting to get into the swing of things at school.  So far I have taught about Halloween, Thanksgiving, the difference between American schools and French schools, Scotland (barely, mainly a review, but WTF right?), describing a person and what they are wearing, and I even taught/attempted to teach the 6e (sixième) or 6th graders (10-11) the hokey pokey (they had a LOT of fun with that).  There were also a lot of question and answer periods, but those have for the most part dissipated with the exception of a Q&A I have with the 3e at Beuvrages tomorrow (3e or troisième are the equivalent of 9th graders).  Tomorrow I only have to work 2 of my 6 hours at Beuvrages because two of the teachers have to train tomorrow and the other doesn't need me.  This has let me stay up late talking to my mother and watch 4 episodes of Prison Break.  I promised my darling brother Craig that if he would send me the DVDs I would watch them before I came home (originally scheduled for May).  I am trying to appease him but also loving the storyline!  Can't believe it has taken me this long to watch this show!

Although I don't have to work tomorrow, I do have a lot to get accomplished.  I have to try to prepare my answers for my students and ready some visuals if possible.  Also I need to shower as I did not take one today.  I also need to go to school early to talk to the principal about getting the Thursday before the break off so that I can leave December 15 instead of December 17 to come home.  As soon as I buy my ticket, I will let everyone know!  I am very excited to get to go home and spend the holidays with family and friends.  I think this holiday season will be pretty special.

Other things happening in my life...we had a holiday last Thursday so I had a five day weekend because I work neither Wednesdays or Fridays.  I drank a bottle of wine plus every night.  It was drunken bliss with minimal hangovers.  Also we tried to go to football (soccer) match here in Valenciennes, but it got rained out (womp womp).  Instead had a homemade meal courtesy of Allison and we hung out until about midnight when we met up with a bunch of British assistants.  New friends!  It was a drunken but fun night and we got to go out dancing (whoop whoop!).  Today I got sushi with Shelby.  It wasn't as good as the other place, but it was still yummy.  I cannot wait to mange on an Ichiban roll when I get home.

This weekend holds in store for us a Thanksgiving celebration!  There will be turkey and who knows what other sort of assortment of American, British, and French cuisine.  It's a potluck so I have to try to find something to make.  Maybe green bean casserole.  Maybe something else.  Who knows.  All I know is that I want to stop talking about Thanksgiving and just get my eat/drink on.