I'm very thankful for...

Howdy Dear Reader,

In honour of my very first Thanksgiving, I have decided to break with the traditional of writing different forms of German greeting (though not enough to dispel with the British spellings of things). Despite American Thanksgiving having been last Thursday, the dinner was moved to Saturday, in order to give our chefs time to cook all the mountain of food that we enjoyed. According to our trivia quiz on Thanksgiving (I'm pleased to say that the Americans did well but the rest of us internationals had no idea what was going on), all the food that is traditionally eaten is native to America - turkey, potatoes, cranberry sauce...

In order to help the internationals understand what we were celebrating, our American friends told us the story of Thanksgiving. From memory of what they said, Thanksgiving is a festival which celebrates a feast that occured in the first winter of the European's arrival in America (in the year 1621). The pilgrims were struggling to find enough food, so the native Indians gave them enough excess food to enjoy a feast together for three days. Every year they celebrate this feast in order to show their thankfulness to the Indians, although the message has changed slightly over the years to 'forget' the Indian contribution and instead to be thankful to God for providing food.

Despite arriving a little late, there was still plenty of food to go around - so much so that my friend's flat is now covered in bowls of half-started dishes, much like after Christmas Day lunch through into Boxing Day. On my arrival, a container of corn was thrust in my direction with the instruction to take some out. Not knowing what this symbolised, I carefully selected three pieces. This was wise, as it turned out to be the number of things we had to tell the fellow members of our Konstanz Family what we were thankful for this year. Being told to go first also posed a small problem but I decided to stick to the situation - I'm very thankful for... (1) good friends; (2) being able to come to Konstanz; and (3) being served up a delicious dinner. It seemed that this was the right direction to go in, as many others also followed suit and while a few decided to be thankful for some stranger things - such as their bike - it seemed that the feeling was very much about acknowledging how lucky we all were to be in Germany, getting to travel and being cooked delicious food!

One of my favorite new food discoveries was that of the Pumpkin Pie. Although my sister and I have previously tried to make this delicacy, it was certainly better having been cooked by someone who knew what she was aiming for! Baked with fresh pumpkin from her 'Jack-o-Lantern', it tasted scrumptious and I am very much looking forward to eating the left over slice currently sat in my fridge.