Happy Thanksgiving!

So, I may be in a country that doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving, and I may have had to work on both days that most Americans get off work, but at least I got to eat some turkey. And talk about it, a lot, in my 感恩節 lesson plan.

I was actually lucky enough to have two Thanksgivings. The first was last Saturday night; we met an American woman at a bar a few weeks back, and she was kind enough to invite us to her own American Thanksgiving at her apartment. So we enjoyed a Costco turkey, homemade pumpkin pie, and lots of other traditional American Thanksgiving food (including mashed sweet potatoes, provided by Apartment C) in the company of several English cram school teachers from the US and Canada.

The second Thanksgiving took place on Thanksgiving night and was held by the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) in Kaohsiung, which is basically the American consulate/embassy (but due to Taiwan's ambiguous political status, it cannot officially be called that). So, the chief of AIT hosted this event for Fulbrighters, our Taiwanese co-teachers, and some other Americans living and working in Kaohsiung. It was more than we could have ever hoped for on Thanksgiving in a foreign country. There was turkey, stuffing, gravy, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, cookies, cranberry sauce... and it was all fantastic. And thankfully for me (and all of you), my fantastic co-teacher Amy brought her camera and sent me all the pictures she took. And Taiwanese people love to photograph food. So, some photos from my first Thanksgiving away from home, care of Amy.

Homemade dinner, probably in the largest domestic oven in southern Taiwan... which would be average size in the U.S.


Pumpkin pie... straight from Costco!

A lot of the Fulbrighters and our co-teachers, with Mason (deputy chief of AIT):

Amy, Susan, and me, with the host (chief of AIT-Kaohsiung, or whatever you call it):

Note my insistence on wearing a sweater, even though it certainly wasn't cold enough to do so. The good news is, it was as low as 65 the other day! I hope these "cold fronts" come with more frequency from now on. (It's back to 78 today.)