The Expatriate Thanksiving in Paris

As you may have guessed, my actual post dates don't necessarily correspond to the dates the events described actually occur. That is why I will have to posts today centered on the topic of Thanksgiving, but the events they described happened on two different days. The first post about Thanksgiving happened on the day. What I will describe in this post happened last night and into this morning.
As you already know (my egocentricity dominates my writings in this blog... I automatically assume that you have read the previous post), I spent this Thanksgiving away from home. I was extremely grateful for the French families invitation to dinner, but it was still Thanksgiving and I hadn't any turkey. So, when my buddy Brendan texted me to tell me that a bunch of American assistants were getting together to celebrate Thanksgiving on Saturday night, I told him I was definitely in.
The apartment that we had this feast in was about 2 hours from Paris, nearly the farthest you could be from Paris and still be considered "Ile de France." (basically Paris and its suburbs). That being the case, this was a sleepover Thanksgiving. At 4:30pm we left Paris on our way to the apartment. We didn't arrive at our destination until about 7:15 and we still had to do grocery shopping. We didn't start cooking until about 9. The actual meal didn't take place until 12:30 AM. I had my turkey this Thanksgiving, at 12:30AM with 14 other Americans, who under any other circumstances would never have met or spoken to each other in their whole lives. But, this is what makes the expatriate experience so unique. Although at home probably none of us would have never known each other, both due to distance and personality disparity, we shared this most intimate of holidays with perfect strangers. At times this was a rather trying experience both due to the tardiness of the dinner and the drunkness of the other males at the party. Yet, when it was time to eat, we ate happily and with much Thanksgiving because, dispite the vast difference of the culture we lived in, we were able to continue our American traditions. I am not sure I would ever want to do it like this again, but considering the circumstances, it was still something resembling Thanksgiving.