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Welcome to Stuff I Learned Yesterday. My name is Mandy Wichert. The tiramisu did not turn out as expected. The mascarpone was great, but liquefied when combined with eggs before being applied to the cake, so I had to improvise and add pudding mix. Which means, Clint’s cake ended up being more of a low carb chocolate mousse cake, rather than tiramisu. The good news is, Clint still liked it and it did taste good! Chalk it up to another lesson I have yet to learn, and I believe if you aren’t learning you aren’t living. Today I’m taking you on a trip to Sweden with me to reminisce about my best Thanksgiving yet and we’ll discuss what makes this holiday so worth celebrating.
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What I Learned Yesterday:
In November 2002, I was studying abroad in Sundsvall, Sweden. Sundsvall is located on the Gulf of Bothnia, part of the Baltic Sea and is 395 km or roughly 246 miles North of Stockholm, Sweden. As you can imagine, by November things are beginning to get chilly in Sundsvall. In November the average temperatures range from a high of 36 degrees to a low of 23 degrees Fahrenheit. They also have a lot of precipitation owing to their gulf climate, much of which is, of course, snow. By the time Thanksgiving rolled around, the other foreign exchange students and I had been together for roughly 3 months, and begun to know each other quite well. We spent all of our free time together exploring our new home and taking day trips to exotic locations, like Ikea.
During my time studying abroad, I learned so much about myself, what I believed, how resilient I was and who I was as a person. Beyond that, I forged some life-long friendships. I don’t want to go too in depth about my experience studying abroad in this episode, because there was so much I learned and I feel like that’s better left for another time. Today I do want to talk about celebrating with my international friends. I attended a Mid Sweden University, and lived off campus in a flat with other two other international students, from Germany. I’m not sure how many of us there were, but I’d estimate around 35-40 in total. We came from all over the world the U.S., Germany, Spain, Columbia, Canada, Belgium, the Netherlands, Greece, Italy, Denmark, the Ukraine, France, the U.K. and many other places.
We enjoyed engaging in political discussions, which I admit, I was ill-prepared for, getting to know one-another’s customs and celebrating our diversity. On any given weekend, you could find us gathering in each other’s apartment to enjoy a meal prepared from the host’s country or celebrating other countries holidays. But, the one holiday that most of the students were interested in partaking in, in particular was Thanksgiving. They had seen it reenacted multiple times on television and were very curious about the customs involved. So, the other American’s and myself came up with a brilliant idea. We invited all of our fellow international students, and then came up with a long list of traditional Thanksgiving meals. We all sat down together and discussed what we typically had around our own tables for Thanksgiving. Turkey, of course, ham, stuffing, green bean casserole, sweet potato casserole, mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce, Rice Krispy treats, apple pie, salads, pumpkin pie, pecan pie – you name it. Then we found popular recipes online and printed them out.
We planned the meal, then arranged one recipe for each person and gave them a card with one traditional Thanksgiving recipe that they were responsible for creating and bringing to the Thanksgiving feast. Everyone was so excited to attempt a recipe foreign to them, and it was interesting attempting to shop for the necessary ingredients in a place where they were not normally stocked. In America, as Thanksgiving nears you can walk into almost any grocery store and you will immediately be faced with rows upon rows of stuffing mix, canned cranberries and pumpkin pie puree. The fact that these items were not available to us in Sweden made the adventure even more exciting. We did manage to find a turkey, which we baked to perfection and I found a large pumpkin that I was able to dissect to create my first from scratch pumpkin pie.
I remember receiving a large care package just in time for Thanksgiving festivities from my Mom. Inside I found all kinds of wonderful ingredients that were specifically American. My mom sent me a canned ham, plain white marshmallows, pumpkin pie spices and of course random trinkets for fun. She had also enlisted Clint’s help. He and I were dating at that time, and had just begun our courtship before I left for Sweden. He had included an American Flag folded up inside the box, and it had been signed by Clint and my family with encouraging messages scrawled on the white lines.
When we decorated for Thanksgiving, we made a wall of Thanks, where we had everyone entering trace their hands and draw little hand turkeys like we all did when we were young. Then they signed their turkey and wrote a little message. We displayed the American flag and everyone also was able to sign this. We also cleared out the furniture from an entire living area and borrowed furniture from other flats to construct a labyrinth of tables and chairs for our guests to sit, talk and eat. We used bottles with pillar wax candles for lighting and had nice music playing. We also made labels for all of the dishes that people were brining, so that everyone would know what they were tasting.
As our guests arrived, we removed our shoes in typical Swedish fashion, and left them by our door with care. People came in exuberant and with an uncommon formality. They were really taking this event very seriously and were excited to present their dishes and to taste them as well! We filed through the kitchen collecting our sides, and then when everyone was seated, we brought out the bird! The turkey was cooked perfectly and was completely devoured in no time. Some of our Swedish friends and our Swedish instructor were also surprisingly able to join us for this event. She brought glogg – a traditional Swedish mulled cider for us to share, which was rich and aromatic as it warmed on the stove.
Thankfully there was enough of food for everyone! Once everyone was seated with their food, we announced that we were going to go around the room and each say something that we were thankful for. We explained that despite its origins Thanksgiving is traditionally a time for us to just enjoy one-another and be thankful. It’s a time to reflect on all that we are grateful for and to share with one-another. We expressed that the holiday was special to us because it was so unifying, so inclusive, so loving. And we also talked about how it was traditionally celebrated by gathering of family and close friends and how those friends in attendance were our home-away-from-home and thus, our family-away-from-family. We also shared how much we appreciated the holiday for being so unassuming – a holiday about sharing with our friends and enjoying one-another’s company, and not about receiving anything in return.
As we went around the room, people all understood and as the sweet words of Thanksgiving tumbled out of each student’s mouths, the entire room felt closer and more intimate, truly like family. The air was rich with love and laughter and we all celebrated late into the evening. The grand finale was the wishbone dual, and I think, somehow we all got the luck of breaking the long side.
What did I Learn?
That Thanksgiving was one of the best memories I have. Every year when I begin to prepare to celebrate Thanksgiving, I think about that fortuitous Thanksgiving celebration, when people from many nations were joined to celebrate being Thankful. There was no judgment, no condemnation, and no lack of sincerity. Everyone was respectful and excited to participate. I remember feeling so overwhelmingly happy to be sharing the true meaning of Thanksgiving with this group of people who life had brought together. Celebrating this traditional meal with my study-abroad friends helped me to realize all that I was thankful for, and my heart was overflowing with gratitude.
Thanksgiving can occasionally be a time of stress for families as they prepare to welcome visitors into their homes. It can be a time when people feel pressure to come together and be formal, it can be a time that we lose our sense of gratitude and celebrate only gluttony and laziness, a time when perfection becomes our enemy, but it does not have to be. This celebration with my friends, filled with mementos from home, helped me to realize how thankful I was and how glad I was to be alive and to be in that moment. I haven’t had a boring Thanksgiving that I was not eagerly anticipating since that one, and I doubt I ever will.
Thanksgiving is a time for giving thanks, and for celebrating sharing and caring for one another. It is a time to slow down and savor company, a time to enjoy your family and friends and to really connect with one-another. As many of our friends left that evening they further expressed their gratitude that we were able to share this holiday with them, and many of them promised that this, although not customary to their country, was a holiday that they would be taking back with them to share with their families and friends. It warms me to think that some of them have sweet memories of this time of year and are able to look back and be thankful of that memory.
My hope is that everyone gets to experience the magic of Thanksgiving this year. That each person listening will be able to roll with the punches, and let go of the stress of perfection to leave room for fully enjoying one-another’s company. That everyone will take time to express their gratitude on this sweet holiday and of course, that you will enjoy some good food with friends and family. I am so thankful for all of you and for my GSM family this holiday & I sincerely hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving.
I’m Mandy Wichert, and this has stuff I learned yesterday.
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