I had an incredible Thanksgiving this year. There were tons of things to distract me from it, including writing my novel, the demise and reincarnation of my computer, and helping another volunteer out at her organization. But everyone else pulled through, and because of them, I am very thankful that Thanksgiving was a complete success!
Along with 13 other volunteers, I celebrated in the deep south of Armenia. To get there, we had to drive about 8 hours over a couple mountain ranges with snow and heavy fog. I saw Iran, on the other side of the rickety barbed wire fence and across the river, which was crazy.
We had a decorating contest with the Thanksgiving group in the north, but they didn’t actually know about it–it was all in David’s head. Oh well. David and Jessica, our incredibly talented crafters, did an awesome job “beating them.” We had Indian headdresses, and a Pilgrim “toastmaster” hat, pomegranate turkeys, a table runner, fall leaf decorations, and a homemade cornucopia!
One final fun thing (for me, at least) was that we had 14 people there, which is the exact amount of siblings I had. So I named all my Peace Corps friends by my siblings’ names. It was fun to have a dinner with all my brothers and sisters this year. Thanks for indulging me!
See pictures for more…
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- Thanksgiving Day Dinner
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- Arrival in Lehvaz
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- Pomegranate
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- Persimmon
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- Pomegranate Turkey
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- Creating the Cornucopia
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- Turkey Trot
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- Turkey Prep!
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- Finished Cornucopia
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- Decorated Table
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- Table Decoration
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- Tom Carving Turkey
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- Thanksgiving Assembly
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- Thanksgiving Food
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- Sibling Thanksgiving
One final thing was figuring out who owed how much money. We added up all the expenses and split them evenly. I created a spreadsheet in Excel and took charge of that. If you’d like to see part of it, click the link. (It was actually more complicated, because there were some expenses that some people didn’t take part in, and thus didn’t have to pay for, but the link shows the general idea.) The main reason I volunteered to do this (besides the fact that no one else wanted to touch it with a 10-foot pole) was because I needed a real-world Excel lesson for my students at the college. Bingo! This spreadsheet is designed, uses formulas, and is relatively easy to explain.
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Hi Ev! would you be able to pass this request to PCVs working in the town of Gyumri in the north. Here is the site address in need of help:
http://norluyce.com/
Gyumri-based organization, seeks short term volunteers to support the organization’s activities aimed at providing orphan children with mentoring relationships with professional adults — helping to improve academic achievement, problem-solving ability, setting and aspiring to reach short and long term goals, preparing for college and a career, and improving self esteem.