An English Thanksgiving
Anna Mansager – An English Thanksgiving
An English Thanksgiving
by Anna Mansager
“Come to Exeter and we’ll have an English Thanksgiving.”
These were the last words of an email I received one November weekend from my best friend, Emily, while studying in York, England. I had been happily ensconced in the walled campus of York St. John University for the past month and a half, going to lectures taught by bespectacled, crisp accented men and discovering the joys of low grade beef burgers topped with shredded cheese from the student bar in the welcome center.
I was living in a single closet-sized room that looked like a hotel from the fifties, complete with a dark blue stained carpet, heavy curtains, and even a tiny sink in the corner like in the movies. However, for all of its simplistic charm, the student housing building reserved for international students had one fatal flaw. There was no kitchen. Actually, let me rephrase. There was technically a kitchen, which consisted of a sink that only dripped if you turned it on, an electric stove that didn’t work, a mini-fridge that smelled suspiciously of spoiled fish, and for some inexplicable reason, a bathtub.
So when the week of Thanksgiving rolled around, I decided I would visit a pub and quietly toast my family back in the States while subsequently getting pissed on Strongbow. Then the fateful email from Emily arrived. While I was studying in York, she was simultaneously studying at the University of Exeter, a year below me. She had emailed me to say that she didn’t want me to be alone on Thanksgiving, since she knew how much of a big deal it was to my family, having heard it detailed by me in emails and letters in the past years. Also, being a Brit herself, she was curious to see what all the fuss was about, and experience the tradition for herself. Eager at a chance to display my American roots and visit my best friend at the same time, I boarded a train to Exeter on Wednesday.
Armed with a box filled with strictly American Thanksgiving goodies sent to me by my mom in an international display of motherly affection, I arrived at the train station in Exeter to a torrential downpour. Being England, rain was not uncommon – however, Exeter was something else entirely. The city often had ten different types of weather just blocks away from each other. It could be raining on one side of the street and bright and sunny on the other. Unfortunately, Emily’s house was on a side of the street that always seemed to be raining, and it was not pleasant rain, or even the drippy, foggy rain that is associated with England. It was freezing, cold, hard rain that drove itself into your very bones and convinced you that you would never be warm again.
After Emily and I bravely battled the monsoon from the train station to her house, I soon found out that the heat in her house was not working, and had not been working for the past month. (The things the Brits put up with just so they won’t have to bother someone astound me sometimes). “We just wrap up in blankets and hot water bottles,” she said brightly.
Nevertheless, I was happy to be there, the cold notwithstanding, and I was excited to demonstrate my expertise on the tradition of Thanksgiving. I pulled on two hooded sweatshirts and went to work. I began unloading my mom’s box (pumpkin pie mix, pumpkin pie crust, canned cranberry sauce, Oreos and candy corn), while Emily, her housemate Liz, and her two friends Kat and Hannah decorated the hand-trace turkeys that I had shown them.
“It’s traditional to have turkey,” I told them. “But I personally don’t really like it.”
“Then we won’t have it,” Emily said simply.
I was shocked. No turkey on Thanksgiving?
“But – it’s Thanksgiving,” I blurted stupidly. “You have to have it!”
“Well we’re not going to have it if you don’t like it,” Emily said, and that was that. The traditional turkey was out the window, and a baked chicken from Marks and Spencer’s was the new contender. I mashed up three sweet potatoes in a baking dish and began to top it with marshmallows before I put it in the oven. Hannah shrieked and pointed at the baking dish. “What are you doing!?”
I looked down, but there didn’t seem to be anything amiss with the dish, other than the fact it wasn’t baked yet. “Putting the marshmallows on?” I answered, confused.
“That’s disgusting!”
“You’ll like it,” I assured her. “Just wait.” I slid it into the oven, deaf to her squeaked protests. The rest of the cooking went smoothly, although we did have a mishap with the green been casserole – I had been unaware that you needed to cook the green beans first, before dousing them in cream of mushroom soup and fried onions.
Finally, the chicken was hot, the mashed potatoes were ready, the green beans were happily congealing in cold cream of mushroom soup, and the sweet-potato casserole was ready to go. I grabbed a can opener and opened my mom’s can of cranberries, sliding the cylinder of gelatinous goodness onto a plate. There were four gasps, and then giggling from my friends.
“What?” I demanded.
“Aren’t you meant to cook it down so it’s like a sauce?” Hannah provided.
“No,” I said smugly, “You’re supposed to eat it like this, it’s how we do it in America.”
“Well it looks a bit grim,” Hannah said. “No offense.”
I had no idea what she meant, as the cranberries looked cheerful enough to me. The rest of the occupants of the house wanted to try it though, so I left it on the table and the eating commenced.
Afterwards, the Brits sat in the living room, holding their stomachs and groaning that they’d eaten too much, despite my assurances that these sentiments were perfectly normal, even routine, for Thanksgiving. When I asked if they wanted to try the pie, I had four plastic sporks thrown at me.
Eventually they digested and decided that they would, in fact, like to try the pumpkin pie. I had actually thought ahead for once, and baked the pies at the same time I had cooked the food, which allowed them ample time to chill in the refrigerator. I proudly brought out two plump, chilled pumpkin pies, topped with whipped cream. My friends ooh-ed and ahh-ed. They all put their forks in their mouths. Simultaneously, their eyes bugged out of their heads, their mouths puckered around the forks, and in slow motion, they all spat the pumpkin pie back out.
“It’s cold!” Emily said in total shock.
“Of course it is, it’s supposed to be,” I said, completely dumbfounded by their reactions.
“No. Oh, no. No, no.” Hannah was saying over and over. Like one entity, all four Brits popped up and marched to the microwave to heat their pumpkin pies. I alone ate it cold, with the four of them staring at me as if I were eating chicken eyeballs.
“So, how did you like your English Thanksgiving?” Emily asked me at the end of the night, when we’d gone to a lovely underground pub for cocktails.
“You know,” I told her, “I think an English Thanksgiving is the perfect name for it.”
Bio:
Anna Mansager is a 22 years old living in Norwalk, CT with her two cats, Klunk and Monday. This is her first article ever published.
Follow Anna on Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/LionessGoddess
