Number 12

Thanksgiving turned out to be quite fun. We all worked in the office during the day and worked on our dishes around our work schedule. The Thai's were way into it. Mid afternoon they hauled all the tables and chairs outside, put orange table cloths on the tables, made name tags for seating purposes (Bruce wanted all the different nationalities mixed around the table), put flowers on the tables, spread flower pedals on the ground and made a really nice setting.

Aom and Moon were drafted to peel potatoes for me and then grate them. Porn grated the onions and chopped the garlic (my unorthodox latka ingredient) and then Aom, with great glee, mixed a huge pot of latka batter with his hands. The turkey, which was supposed to take 6-7 hours looked done after 4. The thermometer popped at 82 degrees (Celsius) and Bruce and I wrestled the 10 kilo turkey (22 pounds) over in the roasting pan to brown the bottom. We weren't sure what to do with it when it was clearly done 2 hours early but we made do.

The Lao professors, who I now call Sam and Dave, marinated and grilled water buffalo on the outside grill. The Lao lady professors made several different marinated fruits, most of which I didn't recognize and whose names they didn't know in English. People started showing up around 6 and everyone brought some kind of "harvest" food. There were a number of people I hadn't met including Porn's 74 year old American boyfriend. Everyone got to choose if they wanted to be a Pilgrim or an Indian and head ware were distributed.

We all sat down and I was chosen to tell the story of the first Thanksgiving. Then Bruce went around and had everyone say 2 things they were thankful for. One general thing (parents, friends, family) and one specific to this year. It was a nice gesture as people did their best to express their thanks in English. Porn's boyfriend stood up and said he was grateful for Porn. I turned to Bruce and said; "who isn't", at which point he blew some guava juice out his nose. When calm was restored we finished going around the tables and dug into the food.

I tried a little of most things so as not to offend anyone but my hands down favorite was kau toom which is sticky rice with banana in the center, sweetend with coconut milk and wrapped in banana leaves. I ate about 4 of them and we hoarded all the leftovers to have today. Aom brought something that was made from dark sesame seeds and sticky rice that looked exactly like cow dung. It was a big hit. Bruce made black-eyed pea, collard greens and mustard greens. Wendy made a huge dessert with strawberries and meringue. Justin made some kind of Malaysian rice and vegetable dish, Kim made some kind of Korean little rice pancakes and Ella made blueberry muffins from a mix. There was a lot of food. The turkey was eaten down to the bone but nobody knew you were supposed to eat the stuffing so we ended up with a bare carcass filled with stuffing. I'm happy to announce that the latkas were a big hit and the platter was empty early on.

After dinner I noticed Sam and Dave were working on a bottle of Scotch someone had brought. Aom and Don and the Singapore kids joined in. I suggested to the Lao's that they were going to get all liquored up and go out in the soi (our small street) to chase the dogs around and they seemed to think that was somewhere between funny and a good idea. We cleared all the tables, washed all the dishes and brought all the tables and chairs back inside. The house people sat around talking and relaxing until quite late and then everyone went off to bed.

A good Thanksgiving was had by all in Chiang Mai.