In the next few weeks, my community will start getting ready for Christmas, where we will prepare pato (duck), zapallo (squash), and panetón (fruitcake), among many other traditional Peruvian Christmas foods. I’m looking forward to learning more about that tradition as the time draws near.
My community had not celebrated Thanksgiving before, but they really enjoyed it. One of my favorite parts of the celebration was when all the guests went around the room and expressed what we were grateful for. This was in line with the Peruvian tradition of giving short discursos (speeches) at other celebrations such as birthday parties, so our Peruvian guests were comfortable with this part of the celebration. Many of our guests expressed gratitude for the opportunity to share this meal with us and for our presence as volunteers in their communities. It was heartwarming. Peruvian parties also tend to have lots of music and dancing, so I brought my fiddle and a friend brought a guitar, and we played some traditional Americana music for the group. It was a hit.
In some ways, yes! Our Peruvian Thanksgiving celebration was heavily influenced by the availability of ingredients and resources here. For example, I have not found any cranberries since arriving in Peru. I guess that meant no cranberry sauce! Additionally, very few people have an oven or roaster in their homes, so we had to be creative with how to cook the turkey.
