{"id":21346,"date":"2014-11-24T06:00:28","date_gmt":"2014-11-24T05:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/french\/?p=21346"},"modified":"2017-10-23T13:21:54","modified_gmt":"2017-10-23T11:21:54","slug":"joyeux-thanksgiving-celebrating-thanksgiving-in-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/french\/joyeux-thanksgiving-celebrating-thanksgiving-in-france\/","title":{"rendered":"Joyeux Thanksgiving: Celebrating Thanksgiving in France"},"content":{"rendered":"

When I was living in Paris, Thanksgiving (literally, l\u2019action de gr\u00e2ce<\/em>, although most French people will just say Thanksgiving) was the one day of the year when the American expatriate community would come together as one and reclaim their American-ness.<\/p>\n

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I\u2019ll be honest: For part of the two years I spent living in France, I tried to pretend that I wasn\u2019t American. I didn\u2019t want to be identified as American on the streets, which would mean I wasn\u2019t dressed \u201cFrench\u201d enough. This was during a time when there were some political tensions between France and the United States as well. Most of the time, upon discovering that I was American, conversations with complete strangers would turn into political discussions or remarks about my American accent. Occasionally, this made me uncomfortable enough to try to at least pretend that I wasn\u2019t American. This didn\u2019t happen all the time, but it did happen.<\/p>\n

And, yet, Thanksgiving changed this attitude, at least for me and my American expat friends, every year. We scoured American grocery stores in the 7th<\/sup> arrondissement of Paris for large American-style sweet potatoes (les patates douces<\/em>) and canned cranberry sauce (la sauce \u00e0 la canneberge<\/em>, although I have yet to meet a French person who knows what canneberge<\/em> is!). Some adventurous friends ordered large turkeys, which ended up not fitting in their smaller European-style ovens. Our complex relationship with our native land would turn into unadulterated love and longing. For Americans, after all, Thanksgiving is inextricably linked with family.<\/p>\n

One year, my language group and I organized a bicultural Thanksgiving. Americans and French alike attended a catered Thanksgiving feast at a local church. We stuffed ourselves on plates of stuffed Turkey (la dinde farcie<\/em>), sweet potato and marshmallow pie (la tarte \u00e0 la patate douce et \u00e0 la guimauve<\/em>), mashed potatoes (la puree de pommes de terre<\/em>), string bean casserole (les haricots verts en daube<\/em>), and pumpkin pie (la tarte \u00e0 la citrouille<\/em>). We drank wine and spoke in French, English, or Franglish. To this day, this remains one of my favorite Thanksgiving memories.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a little paragraph in French explaining what Thanksgiving means to Americans. Read it and let me know if you would add anything else, in French, of course!<\/p>\n

La f\u00eate de Thanksgiving est une f\u00eate am\u00e9ricaine qui est c\u00e9l\u00e9br\u00e9e tous les derniers jeudis du mois de novembre. A la base, elle est une f\u00eate chr\u00e9tienne, mais elle est maintenant f\u00eat\u00e9e comme une c\u00e9l\u00e9bration la\u00efque. Tous les ans, les am\u00e9ricains f\u00eatent ce jour-l\u00e0 pour reconnaitre l\u2019histoire des premiers p\u00e8lerins sur le sol am\u00e9ricain. Leur installation ne fut capable qu\u2019avec des indig\u00e8nes am\u00e9ricains et aux bonnes r\u00e9coltes. La c\u00e9l\u00e9bration se fait autour d\u2019une table familiale avec un repas festif et avec une attitude de remerciement.<\/em><\/p>\n

Happy Thanksgiving! Joyeux Thanksgiving!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"

When I was living in Paris, Thanksgiving (literally, l\u2019action de gr\u00e2ce, although most French people will just say Thanksgiving) was the one day of the year when the American expatriate community would come together as one and reclaim their American-ness. I\u2019ll be honest: For part of the two years I spent living in France, I…<\/p>\n

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