Thankgiving!

I can't believe it is this time of year already! NYC is starting to look like chirstmas exploded and the magic and the lights have touched almost every corner of midtown (which I am certainly not complainig about)!!

On the11th November, I was so excited to have my first thanksgiving experince. FAYA hosted a 'friendsgiving' dinner which was a pot luck style where everyone brought their favourite sweet or savory dish to share. I was quite frankly blown away by the food!!! My plate was stacked so high (as you can see (and yes, I did eat the whole plate and did go back for seconds)). There were over 40 people there and it was such an incredible evening filled with food, fun, friends and fellowship. This is for sure a tradition I hope to bring back to the UK after this year!!! Our wonderful young adults pastor, Sarah, opened up her beautiful home for us all, and it was certianly an evening I will remember as a highlight form my YAV year.

I was very interested to learn the true meaning behind the Thanksgiving holiday as it was unbeknown to me. I was recently enlightened (as I believe not many Americans have been) to the 'not-so-worth celebrating' origin to the holiday. Thanksgiving is actually the product of colonialism and slavery!!!

The true history goes as follows: British explores in the 17th centuary were exoloring America and began to colonise there. Many of these colonisers treated the indiginous people with no respect and some were even kidnapped and taken back to Europe and sold as slaves. Alongside this, the British explorers were also riddled with diseases which the Native Americans had never before encountered, thus subjecting them to horrific disease and illness - a catastrophic epidemic. There was one particular region of America which the explores felt they should claim as their own. Tragically, many of the indigenous Native Americans who lived there had already lost their lives due to the presence of foreign disease which the explores had unintentianlly brought with them.

So where does the food come in? The British explorers were starved of food, so a neigboring tribe of indigenous people kindly provided thm with the food they needed to survive. This was the first thanksgiving meal. However the British explorers won the battle against the Native Americans as they percieved their helpfulness as threatening and therefore fought for their claimed terrirory, which unfortunatley, wiped out numerous indiginous peoples.

Nowadays, many American children are taught in school about the first harvest which dated back to the 19th century where the autum leaves and harvest are celebrated. Some say that the meaning of thanskgiving refers to the commemeration for those who fought in the Civil War. Honestly, the history is a little contradicting and confusing!! Having had many converstaions with friends here in NYC, people nowadays choose to celebfrate thanksgiving through spending time with loved ones and sharing what they are grateful for in life. There was no mention of celebfrating colonialism, harvets or veterans of the civil war; but more forcused celebrating love between family and friends (which is something I chose to get on board with).

Anyway, moving on from that slightly depressing glimpse into American history!! The majority of Americans today use the holiday to celebrate their gratitude (as the name suggests) which I think is an important thing to do - and not just once a year. I have never been a person to do 'gratitude journals' or 'daily gratitudes' but I am going to share some things which I am grateful for, and maybe you could try and do the same (yes readers, I'm talking to you).

• My wonderful family.

• My beautifuyl friends, old and new, close and far.

• FAYA and FAPC for welcoming me into their family here in NYC.

• The love and prayers form Banchory West back home (I miss you all dealry).

• Cold sunny days in NYC (these are becoming more frequent now as we get deeper into fall).

• Cosy nights in the flat watching a wholeome film.

• The opprotunity to learn and serve with the World Council of Churches at the UN.

• The opporutnity to live and serve in NYC for a year!!!!

• The opprotunity to travel and explore God'a creation this year (4 continents ticked off this summer!).

Spending the time reflecting on my gratitudes has reminded me that I have so much to be grateful for, and I am incredibly blessed for teh opprotunities and expeirnces I have. I regularly have "pinch me" moments to remind myself how incredibly grateful I am for my life. Something I have learned form being in NYC is that even in times of struggle, there are always think sto be greatful for.

Actual Thanksgiving day is on Thursday (23rd November) and I plan on watching the parade (which will mean leaving the flat at 5:30am to make sure we get in a good position). I was initailly so excited to learn that the parade is in fact a real thing, and not just something made up for the iconic and much loved christmas film in the Read household "Miracle on 34th Street'. We have been given some good tips about where to watch the parade with minimal crowds and top views, so I am super excited for that - less so for the early morning.

With that, I am going to sign off and wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving (whether you celebrate or not) and as always I am very grateful for you for reading my blog.