Every year that I have spent in the United States, I have received the same hype for Thanksgiving as the last. Since Thanksgiving is the only original American holiday, I have noticed that a lot of people here like getting very excited over it. This behavior is not at all weird since it involves eating and putting of your problems to another time with no immediate solution to them. I guess you can say that people deserve a break from all the problems that are going on at the moment. What amuses me is that the way Americans choose to give themselves that break. By inviting all their close relatives to a dinner that they would usually not be able to afford and then spend the rest of the day watching television or playing sports outside. How is that different from any other Saturday or Sunday? I guess the difference would be that the dinner is far more body-centered than any weekend dinner but I guess that’s justifiable since Americans could always use more comfort food.
If you haven’t guessed already, my family doesn’t celebrate Thanksgiving. Which is weird since my understanding of the origins of Thanksgiving is; the Pilgrims and Indians sharing food. (This might come off as offensive) Even though I am not the right type of Indian, I do not recall being invited to anyone’s Thanksgiving dinner party. Maybe it was because they all know that my family would not attend even if we were invited. Or maybe it was because in the past, my family is known to ignore all pointless gatherings where the only purpose was to “have fun”. Whenever I tell this to people, they always look at my family and I as unsocial. In no way is this true. We love talking to people. When there is an actual point. Otherwise, it is just a waste of time.
I just realized that I have written what I would consider two paragraphs without even addressing the question for this blog entry. How was my Thanksgiving experience? I woke up at 11PM and spent the entire day doing SAT practice problems. At around 3PM I had a very satisfactory lunch and continued to do SAT practice until 5PM. Then I put on my video game pants and got ready for my daily Call of Duty session. I was quite disappointed since all the people I usually play with were wasting time somewhere else instead. I had to fall back to my foreign friends (It’s funny that I refer to people from my own country as foreigners now). I stopped playing at around 7PM and was getting ready for bed since I had to wake up the next day at 4AM for Black Friday. That brings me to my favorite part of Thanksgiving. Black Friday. The one American tradition that I have no complaints on.
In conclusion, my Thanksgiving was more of an anti-body experience than a body-centered one. Which means that I tried spending my time according to what would be better for my mind. In no way do I say that I succeeded, but “I tried my best”.
