Early on Thanksgiving Day

bad words.... sorry!

“It’s November 22...
Can we go home now?”

“I fucking hate myself. Rather, I fucking hate that I’m never happy where I am.”
--- setting the mood for Thanksgiving day.
Quotes from my friends.

I woke up this morning at 8:30 and ate breakfast. I saved my UHT milk for today and enjoyed some rather tasteless corn flakes with milk. You wouldn’t recognize this as out of the ordinary, but pause for a second to remember that Moroccans don’t know what cereal is, and if they do, they don’t put milk on it. I haven’t had cereal and milk since August. This morning, breakfast was as exciting as it was unpalatable. You don’t complain about the flavorlessness of cereal when you haven’t had it for three months.
After breakfast, I broke. Feeling the full pressure of missing Thanksgiving in Kentucky weigh upon my soul, I gave in. I turned my computer on and started washing the breakfast dishes with pink hand soap. When the computer had loaded all its applications, which takes something like ten minutes now, I anxiously clicked through the menus of Windows Media Player and located my prize: Celtic Women’s A Christmas Celebration. It’s not that their Christmas album is better than others... quite the contrary. Their sweet soprano voices can grate on the ears after a while, even though their sound is probably the closest we’ll ever hear to the heavenly host that visited Matthew’s shepherds. (Or was it Luke? I just ran around my hotel room chanting “Where’s my Bible? Where’s my Bible? Where’s my Bible?”, much to my roommate’s annoyance. “Why do you need your Bible?” “I can’t remember where the shepherds are ” I cried. “They’re either in Matthew or Luke, but not both... and I can’t remember ” If any of you reading this know the answer, please enlighten me).
I melancholily (wow that is a word) returned to my task of dish washing and hotel-room arranging, listening to O Holy Night and The Little Drummer Boy and dreaming about the turkey and stuffing I’m missing.
I have no complaints (well, at least not big ones) against Morocco. I’m even entertaining the idea of returning here after graduation to teach English for a year. However, I’d be lying to myself and everyone who reads my blog, though, if I didn’t admit that it’s difficult here sometimes. It’s hard to miss out on beloved annual traditions. This morning I was craving the sight of a Santa Claus or a holiday wreath They’re out there in America now, I know.
My friend Rebecca walked into the room about fifteen minutes ago and saw me crouching over my computer, clicking through other music selections. “Whatcha doin’?” she asked. “Listening to Christmas music...”. She laughed. “It’s November ” she said. I stood up. “Yes, and in America there are Santa Clauses and holiday lights and they’re going to light the Christmas tree in my hometown,” I only half-faked the whimpering. She laughed as she walked back to her own room.
So, stateside readers, whenever you are pissed off by the oppression of the American Christmas, remember that you might miss it dearly if you didn’t have it. I too hate that Fayette Mall is transformed into a reindeer’s playground the day after Halloween, but today I also wish I could see some red and green garland— that I could smell Christmas cookies baking.

Enough of missing America. There are so many things for which I’m thankful here in Morocco. First, I love that my friends and I have transformed this hotel in central Rabat into a regular dormitory. This morning I walked to TaReva and Miranda’s room to retrieve my detergent, and after TaReva answered the door, entered a hotel room turned comfortable dorm room, with half of the room looking like a kitchen/dining room, the other half looking like a bedroom and bathroom. They have a beautiful view of the café below us, and of the grassy boulevard/park in front of the Parliament building. TaReva and I talked about our evening plans for Thanksgiving (we actually get to go to the home of Rabat’s lone Protestant pastor for turkey ), and as I walked back down the hall and stairs to my room, I smiled and was thankful for all of my American friends stuck with me in Morocco. It’s much better to have friends with whom to laugh and commiserate about missing Thanksgiving than it would be if I were traveling and researching by myself. So, I’m thankful for friends and for small pieces of American-ness wedged between constant and intense experiences of Morocco.

And now I’m going out with Carly and Rebecca to our favorite pricey French restaurant where I will enjoy a goat cheese salad, olive pate, and Coca-Cola light with ice. It is the Coke with ice that I am most excited about. Ice just doesn’t exist in Morocco, but it does in this little piece of paradise.

More thanks to be written and given later.