Thanksgiving, Kartause Style

I can hardly appreciate in one day the blessings that I have received this past year, let alone this past semester. Getting to celebrate Thanksgiving here in Gaming with students and faculty that I’ve gotten to know so well and become so fond of was yet another blessing.

Thanksgiving run down:

Our town celebrated its Thanksgiving months ago, so we at the Kartause were alone in our 4^th-Thursday-of-November-Turkey-roast…so we got to go to class on Thursday morning, since everyone else in Austria does that.

Mid-day was the Thanksgiving mass. We borrowed from Austrian tradition and had an enormous harvest crown brought in holding a bunch of fruits and veggies that Father Brad blessed. After mass everyone was invited to take a blessed fruit or veggie...and I must say blessed apples taste better than regular ones. For some reason nobody wanted the tomatoes, so we had a salsa party in Father Brad's office while he tried to figure out how to play Amazing Grace on his electric guitar. That didn't sound so good.

No Thanksgiving is complete without football. With no TV in sight, a bunch of the guys headed out to the intramural fields and started a pickup game in the afternoon.

Come 1730, it was time for the feast. From the belly of the kitchen came a turkey flaming with sparklers, at the sight of which the entire Mensa broke out in song with The Star Spangled Banner.

Post-dinner was the ball. We all dressed up in Dirndles and Lederhosen and learned Austrian folk dances until the Schuhplattler guys came in and showed us all up.

I can safely say it was no Rhode Island Thanksgiving. We only have 11 more days here (ah!!), and I can't think of a better way to have started wrapping up the semester.