介绍:
LW: Today is the fourth Thursday in November, which means it is Thanksgiving, for our friends in the United States, anyway. It is a time of celebration, it’s a time to be with family. So, Brian, maybe you can tell us a little bit more about Thanksgiving, where it got started, what does it mean to you.
BK: Sure. So Thanksgiving is pretty much just a North American kind of thing, and when I say that I mean pretty much just the US and Canada. Two different days – today’s the US Thanksgiving, the fourth Thursday of the month. The Canadian one is the second Monday of October, and, (I’m) not from Canada, but from what I’ve heard there’s a couple different theories as to where that come from. One is that there was an explorer who was trying to make this passage, like, over the north of Canada, like the Northwest Passage or whatever, and all the way from England and it was very difficult; finally got there and decided, you know what, you know, give thanks for making it all the way here. Another one goes that there were some French settlers that had came over to Canada and they had a good harvest and were very thankful for that. But that’s all I know about the Canadian one. For the US one, the traditional account of what it is, is you had the Pilgrims, these settlers over from England, coming over there about four hundred years ago, and they were having some difficulties, so the native people, the Native American Indians helped them out, they teached [taught] them how to do some things, they give them some food, and they end up having a good harvest, and not, you know, gonna die for the winter or anything like that. So, they have a big celebration where, again, you got the Pilgrims and the native people, and I’m not sure how true that is – there’s debate over that, but that’s what you learn in elementary school anyway, and so it was that, and there was originally a bit of religious part to it, you know, giving thanks to God, that sort of thing, [be]cause all the settlers were Christian and what-not, and it’s been a national holiday since at least the Civil War in the US, where President Lincoln declared it to be one there.
WY: I regard Thanksgiving more to the Mid-Autumn Festival in China [LW: Okay], because both of them, they are those kind of harvest festivals, and also they are celebrating the harvest. And also in China we have the Mid-Autumn Festival, which is maybe similar, and also the Dongyuan and Xiayuan Festivals, and winter solstice. And during Mid-Autumn Festival there has been the family reunion and people will eat the mooncakes, and that symbolizes the same must on dinner as the turkey.
BK: During Thanksgiving, you’ll probably eat too much, but people….
LW: You’ll probably fall asleep afterwards as well, after eating all that food.
BK: This is very true…
LW: There’s no way you can eat that amount of turkey and make it through the afternoon. You have to have at least one or two naps…
BK: Well, it’s usually, it’s usually Thanksgiving dinner, so…
LW: Thanksgiving dinner? So you have in the evening?
BK: Right, [LW: Ooh], right so it’s…and unlike other times, when people don’t like leftovers, this is like, an attraction. It’s like, yes, this was a great meal, we’re going to have it again tomorrow and the day after.
LW: In South Africa, there’s something very similar as well. It’s the day after Christmas, which is Boxing Day, which is not celebrated in the U.S. as much…
BK: It’s not, it’s not an American thing [LW: No], it’s a Commonwealth thing.
LW: In the Commonwealth, you celebrate Boxing Day, and usually on Boxing Day, the twenty-sixth of December, you have a big lunch, a big lunch that seems like it lasts for days, it’s a big feast, because at the first of January, if you had a really good Boxing Day, you’ll still be eating the food the first of January.
WY: It’s more like the Chinese Spring Festival, when people would just stay up at night, and watch the Spring Festival gala, and also everyone together, all together, will eat snacks or eat all the delicious food, and it is a mass amount of that on the table, and then people would just stay up until like 2 a.m. in the morning, and to get the red envelope from their senior, and parents.
LW: Well I can say at the office at the moment, there’s some lovely snacks on the table, which I think we’ll all be enjoying over the course of the afternoon.
