Happy Thanksgiving From Rwanda!

Warning: This post contains graphic details and pictures of my latest experience.

Today, we were finally able to celebrate Thanksgiving. It might be a week late, but it didn’t matter to us. We had such grateful attitudes as we prepared this giant feast for all 42 of us and our Rwandan staff members. To prepare for this day we were told 11 turkeys would be arriving a day before and they would need to be killed, plucked, and gutted. In a strange act of courage I raised my hand and was picked to be one fo the 12 people to cook the turkeys for Thanksgiving.

This very long process began with me having to explain to my host family, in Kinyarwanda, that I will not be home all night because I will be killing and cooking a turkey for an American holiday. Although this wasn’t completely successful, I luckily had my language teacher to help me explain. My families (American and Rwandan) both laughed at the idea of me killing a turkey, but I packed my bag for the night.

The turkeys arrived tied together Friday afternoon. As they wandered the

compound, we began to dig the holes we would cook them in later in the night. Luckily, we had another volunteer, Alexi, who was part of the Turkey Team last year, there to walk us through the process. A few strong volunteers grabbed the first turkey, held it down, and cut the neck. We all watched in slight horror and fascination as the neck came off quickly and the body flailed for several minutes afterward. The first turkey was the most scarring. In our naiveness we lifted the turkey too soon and Brendan got sprayed in blood causing me to question why I chose this job and didn’t choose to bake a pie like grandma taught me. After the turkey was completely dead, we hung it on a ladder to allow the blood to drain before we plucked it.

Soon it was my turn with the knife. I knelt down and counted to 3 before I began sawing at the neck. My turkey did not go as quickly as I wanted it to, but soon the deed was done and it was time to pluck. Personally, this was the worst part. The turkeys smelled terrible and it took a few hours to remove every quill. Afterward we began to gut the turkeys and to be honest I was not able to do this part. I had already sliced the head off a turkey

and I couldn’t cut it open and remove it’s organs.

After we wrapped the turkeys in several layers of foil we waited through the night until it was time to begin cooking them. At about 2 o’clock in the morning about half of us woke up again to start the coals for the cooking. With the help of a few Rwandans we heated coals in the large holes we dug earlier in the day and waited until the heat spread through the entire hole. We placed the wrapped turkeys in the pits and covered them completely in banana leaves. We then covered the banana leaves in dirt until we could not see any smoke anymore, creating a large oven in the ground.

As we waited for the turkeys to cook I watched one of the most beautiful sunrises of my life. The sky turned an amazing purple as others began to arrive to begin cooking for the day. My friend, Cara and I lit the imbaburas (charcoal stoves) for everyone to use during the day. Since we are still learning, it took us

about 2 hours to fully light to 5 imbaburas for the day (I will have a longer post on the specifics of cooking on an imbabura later).

During the day, many people came and went as we peeled pounds of potatoes and countless vegetables to make every traditional Thanksgiving dish under the sun. Our language teachers came to help us with anything we needed and the Peace Corps driver, Frank was also there to run countless errands for us through out the day, without one complaint.

After 5 hours of cooking our turkeys were unburied and tasted. I must say it was the best and most moist turkey of my entire life. By the time we ate around 3pm, we had completed every stereotypical Thanksgiving tradition. Someone dropped a turkey, several people had cut themselves, we had run to the market 12-15 times (which is not as easy as it is in the US), and several people had left to take naps before eating.

By the time we ate I had been awake for 36 hours and was beyond tired. I had mashed potatoes, peeled eggs, peeled cucumbers and carrots and squashed 20 avocados. We began our feast and none of us could have been happier. I quickly filled my stomach with one of the best Thanksgiving meals of my life and went back for every amazing dessert that was made. Right after I was done eating my friends escorted me to the gate to send me home to sleep. I slowly walked home with extra pumpkin cookies and pumpkin pie for my family and could only think about falling asleep in my bed.

Although this years Thanksgiving was very different from the one my family had in the America, I am so grateful for this amazing experience and could not be happier that I tried something extremely new to me.