Holiday Traditions, Observed

We Bakkers have pride in our willingness to immerse ourselves in new cultures. That said, we are not about to ignore the great American holiday that celebrates our great nation’s 400-year-long, mostly-well-intentioned imperialism. What’s more, we had fellow Americans in town on Thanksgiving Day!

Will made chicken, because the turkey steaks in the grocery store were intimidating. He also located something approximating cranberry sauce, at the local exotic foods store. Anita came home from work early, so she could mash up the best potatoes Ireland had to offer, finish the sweet potato casserole, and set the dining table. The pièce de résistance was Anita’s pumpkin pie.

It was all possible due to our dear guests, Sharon and Jaime. They brought genuine, A-grade canned pumpkin. This substance, although not well-understood by chemists, is a necessary ingredient in the American version of holiday cheer. In addition, it appears to be more valuable (and more rare) than uranium yellowcake, outside North America. (I suspect that it is banned by the health authorities, due to undocumented process deviations and nonconforming primary substances — that is, they simply don’t believe it comes from pumpkins.)

Throughout October and November, Anita, Will and Kathryn searched the province of Leinster for canned pumpkin, to no avail. Our TreeBut Sharon and Jaime smuggled in the matériel just in time, and we had pie for Thanksgiving. As for any evidence that we now possess a large enough stockpile to begin weapons research — it’s a forgery.

Last week, we escalated the holiday spirit by obtaining a Christmas tree! We brought a small supply of ornaments from Gurnee, and they covered the tree perfectly. It’s in our front window, so we like to think that it cheers up the workers who trudge past our window to face a long commute from our neighbourhood to their overly mortgaged homes in the suburbs.

04-12-07_1519sharp1.pngIn the St Stephen’s Green mall, the closest to our house, children line up with their families to take photos with Santa Claus. In this mall, Santa stays in the fo’c’sle of a pirate ship, which is not bedecked in any holiday paraphanalia (see crappy mobile photo). There is no obvious reason for the pirate theme. That is all.

1 Comment to “Holiday Traditions, Observed”

  1. Sharon said...
    7 December 2007

    I have to comment because the Thanksgiving dinner was great- I recommend all visitor to ask for the same dinner when in Ireland.

    The sweet potato casserole was even better than the pie, which is crazy cause I love pumpkin pie – it’s my favorite pie. The British fancy pants cranberry sauce was awesome – yes I did say British.

    On the canned good smuggling- my dad has this unyielding theory that it is just some random squash & not pumpkin in the can.

    I told him isn’t just like all squares are rectangles, but not all rectangles are square – all pumpkins are squash, but not all squash are pumpkins.

    I think we have agreed to disagree.