Turkey Meal

I was wrong when I said there would be no turkey meal for me.

Just to make a point, I did took mom's advice to add a clock of my local time on the blog.

The turkey meal made me through the day without a second meal!

So, my friend Motema from Lesotho met a nurse practitioner, Betsy when she was in her PE class. They got along pretty well and Betsy invited her over for a Thanksgiving meal. Of course, being her buddy, I tagged along. It was the best decision ever despite I have never met Betsy before.

Predictably, I woke up late at noon and started to walk over to Betsy's house, which is a 20 minutes walk off the campus, up the hills. Those houses were so pretty, almost like Norwegian wooden houses. It was the furthest distance I have ever walk in Hanover, yeah, everywhere is nearer than this! :P

The exercise was worth it, If not I will not be able to move for the rest of the day! We were greeted warmly by Betsy and her whole family- daughters, parents and siblings! Most of them are graduated from Dartmouth!

Grandpa Harry was a 44 ( it means he graduated at 1944) before he joint the navy and met his wife, Mary , who's a physical theraphist and become a MD, he is 86 years old now and still remember clearly about his life back then. Both Betsy and her husband Richard are 77s and they met with each other on a study abroad program of Dartmouth in Russia! Betsy is the second batch of Dartmouth girls in college. Dartmouth only started to recruit women in 1973. Both of them, like Harry also ended up in the medical field where Betsy's a nurse and Richard a 'mcdreamy'- pediatric neurologist( brain doctor specialized in children). Lastly, their oldest son too went to Dartmouth. The rest of the family didn't want to go to Dartmouth, basically they lived too near . haha.

It was altogether Grandma Mary, Grandpa Harry, Betsy's family with Rachel and Alex, and Richard's brother, Rob's family with his wife and children, Elisa, Evan and Ashley, two guests, Hue Min and Andy where Hue min is a Dartmouth graduate from Korea and now studies PHD in Space Science and was their host son, with me and motema on the long dining table. Champagne, white wine, red wine were served along with the Big turkey and other dressing- cranberry , gravy, sweet potatos, etc ( they are sophisticaly made and dilicious!!!)

In the midst of the meal, we took turn around the table and said things that we are thankful for in Thanksgiving. Most of them said the most wonderful things I have heard: Some thankful for the recovery from sicknest, Hue Min is thankful for being lucky and alive after hearing his classmate genocide story from Rwanda, Andy is finally going home to South Korea after 4 years, Grandma is thankful for peace and me thankful for my incredible journey of self discovery and change with acceptance and understanding from my family!

The meal ended with Grandma Mary reading poems of " Keep it goin" , " If", and " the Highway Man" , all meaningful fit to our day's context.

When Betsy, Rachel and Elisa were walking us back to the campus for our next Thanksgiving meal ( no, we didn't continue eating then) , we realized how relevant their Dartmouth experience is to our video project of Dartmouth History that we decided to hold an interview with them the very next morning. Last but not least, Betsy warmly welcome us to be their host daughters.

Though strong and independant that I like to think of myself, sometimes it is good to 'melt' and admit once in a while the need to be in the family atmosphere. Glad that the opportunity came by and I took it!

So my first Thanksgiving in USA, I got my first turkey and a host family!