Thanksgiving, SA style

There is a shocking lack of recognition and celebration surrounding American holidays in South Africa. (OK, we're not too shocked. And, if nothing else, this experience has given us a newfound understanding of immigrants' desires to preserve their native traditions.) "Thanksgiving? What's that? Are we suppose to be giving you thanks or something? For what? You Americans have so many weird holidays."

Now, without going into the nitty gritty of American history in all of its glorious inconsistency, it was difficult for us to explain the benefits of Thanksgiving outside of there being a huge amount of food and lots of family and friends around to help eat it. Luckily, that was a good enough explanation to merit having a little get-together...replete with much food and good company.

That said, it is a bit difficult to get the proper Thanksgiving fixings over here. Although there are plenty of Helmeted Guineafowl wandering around our front yard at any moment...


it's not really our style to choose one...chase it, catch it, slaughter it, pluck it, gut it, stuff it, cook it, and eat it. (If only they weren't so gamey.) Plus, we're hard-pressed to find the right side dishes to compliment said gamey fowl. Cranberry sauce and mom's made-from-scratch stuffing (YUM!) don't come too easy in these parts...especially with no moms around. We could rustle up some yams, green bean casserole, or mashed potatoes and gravy, but that doesn't really hit the right chord when it's 40 degrees Celsius. Nothing much does sound good when it's this hot. Except for maybe the ever-loved "Death By Chocolate" Magnum bar (the South African answer to Haagen Dazs) which offers complete bliss in any weather.

So, what to do? A pizza party, of course. Yeah! Calling all (six) friends: Thanksgiving in South Africa is a go!


Turns out one of our colleagues (the only other American) worked at a pizza place in his younger years. So, he had us over to show us how to make his super secret dough and delicious Chicago-style pizza. Seriously, it was phenomenal. Thick, chewy crust, just the right amount of tomato sauce, and loads of delectable toppings. For a brief moment I thought I was actually in Chicago.


Neil could hardly wait till it cooled...


All said and done, we made five of these scrumptious (and very large) pizzas. There was one with peppadews, artichoke hearts, and beet root that made my heart sing. Then it made my heart burn a bit too. But it was worth every burn-accompanied bite.


Another one was covered in nothing but cheese, beef sausage, and mince. Beef-lovers pizza, indeed.


I haven't heard Neil profess this much satisfaction with a meal since my mom visited Seattle in 2001 and made a spinach and mushroom quiche. (She maintains that it was nothing special. He refuses to admit/believe this). Of course, this time his euphoria may have had less to do with flattering a potential mother-in-law and more to do with the warm glow of a television...a common comfort of which he has perhaps been too long deprived. Ah, what could be better than gourmet pizza and South African soap operas? What a happy little Thanksgiving this was shaping up to be.


Of course, there was a tiny cooking mishap which resulted in the entire house filling with smoke. And when we opened the doors and windows, it filled with bugs too. So, we shut of all indoor lights and (rather reluctantly) made our way to the porch where although we would become the Thanksgiving feast for the bugs, at least we wouldn't asphyxiate to death. The fact that we might all live to see another day made us all pretty happy.


But, where is Neil? Well, you see, Neil is so brilliant a shade of white that the bugs thought he was a huge light bulb and their positive phototactic tendencies went into overdrive. After his arms got tired of swatting away trillions of giant winged-beetles that sound like fighter jets when they whiz by your head, he retired to the darkened house and proceeded to wash all the dishes. What a decent person...and superb dinner guest. He was making quite the headway too until this little friend of his ended up losing it's grip on the soapy surroundings and plunging into the dish water.


It's true that no rural South African event would be complete without some major bug component. But coming from the relatively bug-less haven of Seattle, it's taking us some time to adjust to all of these little creepy crawlies. And this little development brought our involvement in the evening's festivities to an abrupt close. "Bye, everyone! Got to run...bug in the sink. Happy Thanksgiving!"

Rainy Days

The rainy season is upon us. Not only does this mean lots of much-needed water, but also lots of much-needed nighttime excitement...

This kind of light display usually even quells the young locals from “the village” (Acornhoek) who love to blast fusion music over loud speakers which we can actually hear quite well despite the fact that we are about 5 kilometers away and in the middle of the bush. 2am on a Saturday? Party on.

Now, there was something else that comes with the rains…what was it? Oh yes, bugs. Lots of bugs. (I don't know if worm-type things like centipedes and such are considered "bugs" by hoi polloi, but they certainly bother me, so I'm categorizing them as such).

Here is a sampling of a few little attractions I encountered on a 10-minute walk from our house to the WRF lodge just down the road:

I especially liked seeing this beetle take a quick dip in the community pool. And that's just what was floating on top of the water. Pool party, anyone?

My skin is crawling just looking at these pictures...and I still have to walk to walk back home. Ugh. Fortunately, there are also lots of things wandering around here that love to eat bugs. The so-called "critters" of the bush.

The gecko, for example loves flies...even the ones with wings! (This one seems rather rotund. I commend it for evidently ridding us of so many pesky bugs.)

This one is much more slim and should certainly eat more bugs, but deserves some accolades for not blending into it's environment and sneaking up on you when you're out and about.


Lizards are also a nice, natural bug-trap. The only problem with this one is that it likes to relax and sun itself on our windowsill in the afternoon making it a bit problematic to open the windows when it gets stuffy inside. But we encourage anything that reduces the surplus bug population, so we try not to disturb its meditations.


Birds are a great way to get rid of bugs. Not only do they eat lots of ants, termites, worms, etc. but they are quite a pleasure to watch...chirping and hopping about. Oddly, this one seems to have taken a particular likeness to our car. I think it may have mistaken it for a giant plum.


Spiders. I have yet to decide whether I prefer spiders to bugs. It doesn't really matter, of course, since it seems both spiders and bugs are omnipresent here. (Yes, that is our living room curtain...this one was about the size of Neil's palm. When he tried to swat it, it did a backflip off the curtain, landed on his side, and quickly proceeded to scurry up his arm. Neil instinctively performed a groovy 80's dance move to get it off of him and when it hit the floor he hit it...about 12 times with his shoe.)


Speaking of spiders...the other day in church I opened the closet to get a piece of chalk and encountered a spider perched on the inside of the door at eye-level. It was even bigger than the above. (Believe it if you dare.) But it was brown and skeleton-like. Ugh! The kids went into hysterics (uhm, aren't they supposed to be used to this kind of stuff?) and we had to eventually disturb the adult class in order for someone to come remove it with a garbage can and poster board. One heroic man took it outside. Of course, we had to take a little field trip too. When we were done gawking at it from a safe distance --"Whoa, it's SO big!" , "Yuck, it's looking at me!", "I wonder where it will live now.", "Do you think it's mommy will miss it?" (yeah, these kids are that cute)-- we went back inside to finish our lessons. After church we all raced outside to see it again. But, it was gone...

Then there are snakes. OK, I've only see one...a green mamba (small, but highly dangerous). I am more than happy I didn't get close enough or hang around long enough to photograph it. While we may not encounter many snakes, we do see more then our fair share of snicks, you know, sticks that look like snakes. Believe me, snicks are just as scary as snakes when you're out wandering in the bush all by your lonesome. (Aside: When Neil saw this picture he said: "No way, you found a snake? Oh, no. Wow, that stick really looks like a snake!" See, I told you.)

Other people around here have much better luck running across the real deal. A few days ago our neighbor excitedly reported to us that he had found a python in his garden. (I think he told us because he secretly wanted to see us squirm...which we did, of course.) A bit later in the conversation he urged us to come by for dinner sometime. We assured him we would as long as he was serving python stew...and lots of non-python side dishes.

Despite this intrepid crew of bug predators, there are still so many bugs! What are these things doing all day? For instance, the other night we heard what sounded like rain outside. This seemed odd since the skies had been clear and sunny all day. Plus, rains here are usually accompanied by plenty of lightning and thunder (as evidenced above). What was going on? On closer inspection (not too close, mind you), we discovered that about a zillion little beetles and winged ants were taking turns throwing themselves into our windows. It was raining...bugs!

We do our best to keep these kamikaze bugs outside by keeping the windows closed and squeezing through a partly-opened front door when we leave. If the bugs do manage to get inside, they rarely survive to the next morning. (Will they ever learn?) As a result, our windowsills get very crowded.

That's OK, though...because it gives us yet another picture to post on our blog that is sure to gross you out.