Thanksgiving

Fall was in the air in Kandahar.

Hahaha, not really. The weather remains completely mild. It's now December and I'm still completely fine in short sleeves during daylight hours. It's only rained the two times so far.

Starting in early November something strange did start to happen, though. Grass on the boardwalk started cropping up, or getting rolled out. I didn't know how much I missed the green of a landscape with plants flourishing until I saw this synthetic astro-turf:

Grass in the courtyard of the boardwalk!

Soon enough, the grass was smeared with this black stuff. I'm told it was rubber to improve the grip of shoes on the turf. Also lines were painted on the grass.

Everyone gets where we're going with this, right?

Watch out! Watermelon Alligator!

rawr!

So Thanksgiving came around. Compared to missing the Jewish High Holidays, I'm not sure if it was worse or better for me being here, but I definitely missed being with my family. Good thing I had these culinary creations to distract me:

Probably a vegetarian Alligator... but if he ate fruit, would it be cannibalism?

Fruit flowers, and fruit birds, and a bouquet made entirely of vegetables, and made entirely by the kindly people who cook the food at the DFACs in KAF. Who knew they were such artists?

I even ate some cake - which I never do.

They served what you'd expect, turkey, potatoes, 4 kinds of pie... there were things missing, and people were sad to be away from home, but they did what they could to make it special for everyone. There was even a brass band!

The Education Center staff gives thanks together.

Thanksgiving ended with something I've never done on thanksgiving - watching football!

Ohhhhhhhh, that's what the astro-turf was for...

So that was Thanksgiving. You'd think Christmas would be less of a big deal for me because I've never celebrated Christmas, but you'd be wrong. Christmas ranks among my favorite holidays - mostly because of the decorations, the songs, and the movies... it just won't be the same here...

Happy Holidays to all!