happy thanksgiving, bulgarian stylin'

Today is Thanksgiving Day. For someone far away from home, in a country where they don’t even know what Thanksgiving is, today could seem like a downer. But fortunately today I was able to experience what Thanksgiving is all about: people coming together and helping each other, not because they have to, or because they are seeking some kind of payment, but simply because they want to.
      This week has been a rough week for me. I haven’t been getting a lot of sleep, my classes were exceptionally unruly and yesterday I lost a great colleague because the 13th grade doesn’t want to show up for class. So yesterday and today the last thing I wanted to do was host a huge party for Thanksgiving. Today all I wanted to do was teach my classes at school, teach my classes at the prison and take the evening off and relax. Instead, I invited everyone I saw to a big party at my apartment to celebrate a day that few knew about.
     To throw a wrench into the works, I had classes until 1:30, I had to be at the prison from 3:00 to 6:00 and people were coming over at 7:00. That gave me about two hours to bake banana bread, cook mashed potatoes, squash, deviled eggs, dip, salad, prepare a meat and cheese dish and, of course, buy all the ingredients for all that. I knew I had a lot to do, but I believed, like I do all too often, that I could do it all by myself. Luckily, my counterpart here, Galya, offered to come over with her sister after my lessons at the prison and help.
     They picked me up after my lessons and drove me to my apartment. They gave me a huge bag of goodies too, canned fruit, vegetables, sauces, things that you absolutely must have in Bulgaria to get through the winter. As soon as we arrived at my apartment we got to work. After five minutes, a teacher from another school in town arrived, and five minutes after that, two of my students arrived*. Like an army they converged on my tiny kitchen. They didn’t question why, they only asked what they could do. Wielding knives and derogatory comments about my masculine culinary skills, they peeled potatoes, diced onions, mixed salads, boiled squash and beat eggs. By the time my other guests arrived, I actually had things on the table and it almost had the feeling of a real Bulgarian “Na Gosti.”
At first I was ashamed that here were five supposed guests working in my own personal sweatshop. But I soon realized that they didn’t see anything wrong with this. I have heard again and again, after experiencing incredible acts of generosity here, that I needn’t worry about it, that’s how people are here. And yet still I resisted that. How can people who work all summer preparing canned fruits and vegetables for the winter, give them to me like they were nothing? How can people who make about $120 a month, buy me lunches, dinners, coffees without blinking an eye? How can people who work all day, go visit someone else’s home, roll up their sleeves, and work as hard as if they were the hosts?
I don’t know why they are like that here but they are. They humble me. I have money here, the Peace Corps certainly doesn’t let me starve, but the Bulgarians I have met give and give and give till they have nothing left. They have a great sense of what it means to look after ones neighbor. If you need help they are there, with a hammer, some homemade tea, Rakia, or whatever you need. And the only expectation they have is some vague notion that if they were in the same situation, someone would be there to help them.
Tonight, on Thanksgiving, I am thankful to be learning this: to give without expecting. It goes beyond that though, this giving is more than just redistribution of commodities, it is really sharing love. So for all my friends and family stateside, I love you and miss you. Eat some turkey and drink some eggnog for me and be happy knowing that I am loved here.  

*When my students arrived I felt like I had to make some excuse for the craziness that was my apartment. I welcomed them and said “it’s a crazy house!” One of my students smiled at me and said simply, “but it’s happy.”