Just back from a Thanksgiving dinner with friends, eaten on the beach with bare feet in the sand under strands of colored lanterns and a sky full of stars.. Instead of turkey and mashed potatoes we stuffed ourselves with vegetable pakoras, masala curries, dum aloo, palak paneer and stacks and stacks of fresh hot rotis. We were a very multicultural table, with Indians, Bhutanese, Mexicans, Dutch, Swiss, Australian, Icelandic, Norwegian, and we four Americans reminisced about our past Thanksgivings, compared recipes for our favorite foods, and horrified the others with a telling of the Thanksgiving story. There is something about spending holidays 7,960 miles away from the people you love that really makes you appreciate the good in the people you are with.
I am so thankful for everyone in the world that I love; thankful for our health and prosperity, especially when faced with the reality of how so many others in the world live. I’m thankful for the opportunities I have had to travel and see, taste, experience new things every day, for the people I have met that became my adopted family out in the world. And although I am ashamed to admit it, I am thankful that when my travels here are done I have a return ticket back to my peaceful, clean, wealthy country.
