Thanksgiving in Mozambique

No turkey from the grocery store this year!  This year, we kill our own turkeys!

But first you have to catch the turkeys, and boy are those guys fast!  We arranged to have a local restaurant cook the turkey for us for Thanksgiving dinner, but a few of us assisted in the turkey preparation beforehand.  For a good ten minutes or so, Sam, Sean, and Derek chased around the turkeys as they flew over fences, behind buildings, and around the yard behind the restaurant, the turkeys running for their lives, literally.  We were told by the owner that we could have the turkeys that fly because those are the ones that don’t have eggs, supposedly.  Finally, after much running around and with the help of a few boys who work at the restaurant, we finally caught our two turkeys!  I even took a turn holding the turkey because why not, right?  I was fortunate enough to be passed the turkey right as it took a huge poo, but luckily enough for me, it missed landing on my shoe by a mere couple inches.

Then it was time to kill them.  I’ll spare you the details since I think you can imagine pretty well how it works now after my post about killing the chicken.  Let’s just say, turkeys are larger than chickens so there is definitely more blood.  Never before did I ever think I would ever see my own Thanksgiving turkey lose its life right there in front of my own eyes! 

We had Thanksgiving dinner Friday night, potluck style.  Eight girls came over to my house and we made stuffing, gravy, salad, garlic mashed potatoes, spinach dip (except using kouve), deviled eggs, and green bean casserole, all using only carvao (a super miniaturized stove-top like BBQ using charcoal as the heat source).  I think we may have overwhelmed my family a bit, my grandma just took a seat outside eyeing our every move, and they probably think we are all insane Americans, but everything came out pretty good!  

Originally worried about having enough food, I was so surprised by the amount of food everyone brought!  Turkey, apple tarts, fudge, breads, dips, mashed potatoes, stuffing, cake, brownies, veggies, sweet potatoes, rice pudding!  So much food!  All in all, it was a great Thanksgiving, good food, good company.  I have a lot to be thankful for :).