Thanksgiving in Dakar

From the 18^th to the 28^th of November I was house/pet sitting for a woman who works at the US Embassy. There were some major upsides to this, but also some downsides, notably when it came to location. I was living in a completely different part of town. My host family is located in Mermoz, which is pretty much right in the middle along the coast from where the US Embassy is located (in Almadies/Ngor) and downtown (Dakar/Plateau).

The downside to this was I was no longer within walking distance of FASTEF, so it called for a much earlier departure in the morning in order to arrive on time for my 8am classes (which I have 4 days a week). It also meant having to take a taxi anywhere I needed to go, which is a minor annoyance mostly because taxi drivers think they can charge 2-3 times what they should just because of the color of my skin, so the haggling is a bit annoying, especially at 7:15 in the morning!  On the other hand, I was staying in a large house that had not only hot running water (yay for a break from cold showers!), an American washer and drier, but also a fully equipped American style kitchen (which my host family does not have).

I invited Brenna and Colleen over for a Western meal on Friday, to give everyone a break from traditional Senegalese food. Not that it isn’t good, but it’s a bit harder for Colleen and Brenna, who both have dietary restrictions (Colleen is vegetarian, Brenna is gluten-free). We decided to each choose a recipe for something they were craving from home and we’d all make our own dish and share it with everyone. In the end we had a cabbage salad, a caprese salad, macaroni and cheese (but nachos for Brenna), and pumpkin soup… not to mention some wine and hard-cider. We spent a small fortune, but it was worth it! The little dogs were also happy to have more people to love on them, so everyone was happy!

Some Western comfort food!

The kitchen helped a lot when it came to Thanksgiving the next week as well. The Ambassador usually invites the American community (those who work at the Embassy or are connected to the Embassy somehow, such as the Fulbrighters managed by the Public Affairs Section) for Thanksgiving dinner at his house. Colleen and I had RSVP’d and everyone was asked to bring our favorite dish. I had also invited Emily, the other American student being hosted by my host family. I asked her what her favorite Thanksgiving dish was and she said it was stuffing, so that’s what I told them I would bring. Colleen had said she’d bring apple pie. It was a good thing I was house sitting because Colleen realized that her host family doesn’t have an oven either!

We decided to start cooking on Wednesday after we both got done with work, and finish on Thursday before the 4pm dinner start-time. Since we had some leftover pumpkin from the soup we had made Friday, I decided to throw a pumpkin pie into the mix. Last year Anna shared with me her Thanksgiving cooking wisdom/recipes while I helped her make most of her Thanksgiving dinner for 20+ people, and most all of it from scratch, so I was confident in my ability to make the stuffing and pies. Our first challenge was finding all the ingredients. Bread for the stuffing was no problem, but sage was much harder to find, and I completely struck out on the celery front, so I had to switch to mushroom stuffing. For the pies, we found the basic ingredients easy enough (flour, apples, cinnamon, etc.) but I had to phone a friend when brown sugar was nowhere to be found (not even at the American Store!). I called Anna and learned that the sugar-in-the-raw that I had would work, so I was set to go for the pumpkin pie. Pie tins are also not to be found here, and they had requested that everything be brought in disposable containers, so we decided that our pies would just have to be rectangular J

Our pumpkin pie pumpkin

Wednesday I cut up the bread and left it to dry until the next day, and then Colleen and I started with the pie filling. She peeled apples as I cut pumpkin (a small green pumpkin just like the one Anna and I used from her farm last year!). Once we got the two different fillings made, I set out to make the three crusts (two apple pies and one pumpkin). That’s when we realized there was no rolling pin in the kitchen… but we had a wine bottle! That worked just fine J We filled our pies and set them in the fridge for baking the next day. It was now almost 11pm and I had an 8am class the next morning, so Colleen headed home and I went to bed, happy with our progress.

Wine bottles work as rolling pins!

Thanksgiving Day I taught from 8am until 1pm, then met with Colleen in order to head over and finish everything for dinner! Emily ended up not being able to come to dinner because it was too early, so it was just myself and Colleen finishing the pies and stuffing for dinner. We had a very specific game plan in order to get everything done in the time we had (isn’t half of cooking for Thanksgiving time management?). We pre-heated the oven and put the pies in ASAP. While they were baking we prepared the stuffing for its turn in the oven. In the end, everything came out just as we planned and I felt I had done Anna’s Thanksgiving cooking legacy proud! Colleen and I were very happy with what we had to contribute to the Thanksgiving feast.

Our contribution to Thanksgiving Dinner

Dinner at Ambassador Zumwalt’s was very nice. Colleen and I arrived at 3:55 for a 4pm start time and were, of course, the first ones there. It’s hard to get out of the American habit of showing up for things on time! There were maybe 75-100 people there for dinner, and the weather was nice so the tables were set up outside. There were a bunch of round tables set up, each of them sat 8 people, so it wasn’t too overwhelming. The Ambassador provided the turkey, but most everything else was provided by the other guests. One guest (Senegalese-American) even brought roasted lamb (like, brought in 2 actual spits with the lambs on them!) and that was super good! The people at our table had some of what we had brought and said it was good. I also tried our stuffing and pies thought they weren’t half bad!

Although Colleen and some of the other Fulbrighters were there, I decided I wouldn’t sit with any of them and explained that I didn’t want to be rude, but just wanted to meet people I didn’t know. I chose a table that had a spot open and met some other Embassy employees. Ambassador Zumwalt had each table go around and say what they were thankful for throughout the year, as is tradition in his family.

I thought back on the year that I’ve had and was overwhelmed with my blessing for the year. I started out this year in Martinique, then spent the spring studying like a crazy person for my Masters comprehensive exam in French literature, which I passed thanks in large part to a few key people God blessed me with who supported and helped me (Anna, Alyssa & Bailey!). Then I found out I’d been accepted by Fulbright and would be going to Senegal! I graduated with my Masters degree surrounded by friends and family, including my amazing Great-Grandmother who at 91-years old traveled all the way across the country (with the help of my mother) to see me graduate. I then spent a challenging but good summer mentally/emotionally/psychologically preparing myself for Africa, while working with Africans in my final months at the University of Delaware.
An epic family-themed cross-country American Road Trip with two of my favorite people, Morgan and Steven, crowned my summer. I spent some time on the West Coast visiting as much family and friends as possible. 10 days in my beloved Bend, visiting family and staying with the two people who started this all 15 years ago by taking me under their wings and mentoring me, my “Godparents” Carmelo and Marlena, was amazing! I was able to meet the newest addition to our family born in July, Kinsley Jo, while simultaneously spending more time with Great-Grandma Mert. 3 weeks at Aunts Marci and Alice’s Rancho Alimar, one of my favorite places on earth, ended my time in the US, for now. And now, I am in this beautiful country, having amazing, life-changing experiences, doing what I love, and having already met some amazing people that I can tell will probably end up being life-long friends.

Of course, I couldn’t say all that at the Thanksgiving round-table, so I stuck to some of the biggest highlights of the year as we went around. It was a thoroughly enjoyable evening, and we even had a commemorative picture taken with the Fulbrighters present and Ambassador Zumwalt! It will definitely go down in history as one of my favorite Thanksgivings. I know this is a couple of weeks after the fact, but I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and that your holiday season has gotten off to a good start!

A Fulbright Thanksgiving:

Myself, Colleen, Ambassador Zumwalt, Kyla & Ryan