Thankful in Oman

People back home continually ask us: what are we doing over here and how much longer do we have to stay? What so many can't comprehend is that there are a lot of really good things to be thankful for living in Oman, it's just that so many of them are different here than in the States. Being different has never been about all right one way and all wrong another!

I am thankful this time of year for so many things. I am thankful that I serve a loving God, who is slow to anger and compassionate towards me. I am thankful that my Father God loves me, my children, and anyone else who calls upon Him and asks to be a part of His kingdom. I am thankful for a country, America, that was founded on Biblical principles, and for a past president, Abraham Lincoln, who wanted to declare a national day to give thanks to our Father God for His blessings, a day we call Thanksgiving in America. I am thankful for a caring and loving extended family and for our wonderful children and a special granddaughter. I am thankful for friends both in the U.S. and in Oman as well as other parts of the world. I am thankful for a wonderful husband! I am thankful for all of the new experiences we are getting to have here in Oman.

Celebrating what is normally considered a family holiday half a world away from your family can be hard. However, we have learned very quickly over here to form our own unique group of family friends. It is really exciting, though, when we can extend our celebrations to wonderful people of other cultures and share our blessings with them! That is what happened this year when we gathered at our friends' house in Muscat. We had guests originally from India, the U.K., Slovakia, Lebanon, Egypt, Brazil, Jordan, Sweden, Italy, and maybe a few more I forgot! It was fun explaining the meaning of Thanksgiving and our traditions.

First of all, we tried to have traditional American Thanksgiving dishes: turkey, dressing, vegetable casseroles of corn, green beans, and sweet potatoes, mashed white potatoes, and cranberry sauce--in addition to desserts of pumpkin pie, pecan pie,  apple pie, chocolate pie, plum pudding, and berry cobbler.

Don and Mary setting up ahead of time.

Our Indian friends helping before dinner.

Leave it to a pair of architects to have a creative
and organized layout for the olive tray!

Explaining the ingredients in our Thanksgiving dishes to our hosts' teenage daughter and her friends

And the serving begins! Kids first!

Adults waiting for their turn at the buffet

A friend from the UK, me, and Ashwin, our friend from India

Another friend from Slovakia

Enjoying a wonderful meal 

Of course, desserts are the best. Do you see the flaming plum
pudding? A wonderful homemade, traditional British dessert!

I must confess that it is definitely sometimes hard to find all of the ingredients required for specific dishes. We ordered turkeys from the American club, I scoured the non-Muslim sections of the one local grocery chain that has a special room of pork items for ham, and when I found Durkee's French Fried Onions in another grocery store, I bought every single one on the shelf! I didn't think I'd ever do that, but I know other expats do it because I've heard them talking about it--which is where I got the idea that I could do it! (By the way, it was 7 cans, that was all!)

We also had our share of typical holiday mishaps! Our hosts had a gas leak on the propane tank (yes, you read that correctly) for the oven. They had been trying to have it fixed for 2 days when flames burst out from a burner the day before Thanksgiving. Thankfully, it was finally fixed later that day so they could continue with their baking. I got up Thanksgiving Day early in the morning to bake in the oven all the dishes I had prepared the day before. Much to my great dismay, I had no flame for the burners or the oven. Our propane tank was out! Thankfully, I had no leaks! And thankfully, I have a wonderful husband who immediately got dressed and walked the compound to find some workers who would replace our tank. (It was a national holiday here in Oman, but for a different reason, so a lot of workers were off for the day.) The men were tipped nicely for their help--and we were glad to do it!

At the end of the evening, Ashwin joked on being our "token" Indians for the day after hearing
us talk about the very first Thanksgiving, and my husband joked that we Americans were the
"token" pilgrims, since we were visitors in a foreign land! Everybody laughed about that!

It was really a very fun afternoon, with good company and good food, all of which proves we can be thankful anywhere we go and every day for the blessings God has bestowed upon us.