“What is your favorite holiday?” When I ask
someone this question, many American answers “Christmas or Thanksgiving”. I
didn’t know about Thanksgiving, so I was looking forward to having Thanksgiving!!!
My knowledge of Thanksgiving is to celebrate the harvest, and my image was only
eating turkeys, but it is not only this. On Thanksgiving Day, I was invited to my
friend’s Host family’s house and
experienced very valuable things such as a big parade, eating traditional
food, and black Friday.Even though I was in my Host family’s house, I felt like I was in fantasy land. When I asked my host family, “How do you spend Thanksgiving Day.”, suddenly they turned on the TV. I was startled to watch a Big Parade on TV. It is very famous and is in New York. There are many dancers, singers, and popular character’s balloons. I was super excited by it, because I had never watched the parade like that!! I felt to watch Disney parade in Disney land. I envied America which has a parade, and also I thought, “Why Japan doesn’t have a parade like America.”, but then I noticed the difference between America and Japan. Probably, Japan is too small to have a parade, so I will not watch a parade like America in Japan. I was shocked and sad when I noticed this fact. However, I was very happy to watch the wonderful parade.
Through Thanksgiving Day, I understood America food style. When I checked an e-mail which was from my host family, I was amazed! There were many food lists on the mail, and it was a first time to know their food’s names. My image for Thanksgiving was only turkeys, so I was stirred to eat them! When I went to a kitchen, I saw a lot of material such as potatoes, corn, and cheese. Sometimes, I also use these materials for food, but the way of using them was different from us. For example, usually we do not use marshmallows with other food, but they did. They baked sweet potatoes with marshmallows. When I saw them I thought, “No way!”, but actually they were very delicious!! I was amazed, and I started marshmallow cooking. In addition, I ate bread but also bread cooking. It was very delicious, but I could not believe it, because it was mixed the potatoes and other breads. Why is this mixed potatoes and bread? Many food impressed me, because they were new ideas for cooking. However, actually they were very delicious, so I wanted to try to cook them in Japan. I learned many kinds of traditional food today.
Thanksgiving is a fantastic day, but I knew a terrible thing after this day, and I was afraid of America. For me, a good point in Thanksgiving was only food, but I was glad to know another great event. Thanksgiving Day was Thursday, and the next day was Friday. Many people were smiling to look many advertisements, because of Black Friday. In this day a lot of things were sold on sale, so many people research about stuff they want to buy on internet and advertisement. Surprisingly, many shops open at midnight, so people who have a strong desire to buy something go to the shop from midnight, and make a line. I had never experienced this, so I definitely wanted to go somewhere. However, I felt fear to go to shopping to hear a fact from my host family. According to my host family, every year, some crimes happen. There are some reasons. One reason is there are too many people in a shop, so it is easy to steal something from these people. Another reason is some crazy people get angry because of too many people and sold out and they committee a crime. When I knew about Black Friday, I was very excited to go, but also I was afraid of some accidents. Fortunately, in Spokane there are no crimes, but I cannot feel relief because it is possible for these things to happen anyway. I have never heard like this crime in Japan, so during Thanksgiving I knew the fear in America.
During Thanksgiving Day, I had very precious experience with our Host family, such as watching a parade, eating traditional food, and going to Black Friday. However not only fun but also I learned the fear in America. A holiday is a very interesting event, but also I can learn many things, so I want to join the entire event and know more about America.