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who needs a turkey?
the fam in patagonia
I figured since Thanksgiving in Argentina could not be remotely similar to Thanksgiving in the states that I might as well go for the extreme. My family had arrived the morning before, so I knew I had to plan something for them for Thanksgiving. So I invited my entire host family to come to dinner with my family, and we all went and ate at one of the best parilla restaurants in Buenos Aires (parilla is typical Argentine barbeque with a whole lot of red meat!!). The ten of us sat down at a long table and scattered ourselves out. My family doesn’t speak a lick of Spanish, and my host mom knows MINIMAL English, but we all managed to get by a 2.5 hour dinner together. Since we were feasting Argentine style, we went all out. For appetizers, we order chorizo (an Argentine specialty sausage), salads, and melted cheese blocks. For dinner, everyone besides my mom (who is vegetarian) had a big hunk of meat on his or her plate. And clearly, everyone was sipping on tasty Malbec (the best wine ever). Our meal definitely didn’t compare to a perfectly roasted turkey with gravy, mashed potatoes, stuffing, green beans, biscuits, and pies, but it was unique and so perfect for the moment. My family is all about new traditions and breaking the old. They loved it. My host mom loved the idea of Thanksgiving, a day in which family and friends come together to feast and celebrate everything we are thankful for. So we all sat around the table after we finished dinner and each person said what they were thankful for. Translations were being thrown across the room at every statement, but no matter what language was being spoken, everyone’s hearts were touched. My host mom Marina hugged and kissed my mom telling her how much she loved me and how happy she is to have me in her home. I responded stating how thankful I was to have two great mothers. Everyone was thankful to be in the room together sharing the moment. It was so great to have my family together with my host family on Thanksgiving. It was really special. When we got home from dinner, Marina kept telling me how much she loves Thanksgiving and that she is so happy to have celebrated it for her first time. It was my first time eating steak on turkey day, and it was her first time going around a table saying what they are thankful for. There is a first for everything.
The rest of the weekend I went to Patagonia with my family. We stayed in a remote hotel with only ten rooms in it in the middle of nowhere. It was on a turquoise lake in the windy mountains. We had the most amazing weekend hiking and riding horses in the solitude of the Argentine mountains. We definitely made the most of our Thanksgiving weekend taking advantage of everything around us and diving into the Argentine culture.
