Food and Relationships: That's What Thanksgiving is About

As the Affinity Express team enters another season of holidays at our global company, we decided to explore the various celebrations to better understand our respective cultures.  To my colleagues in India and the Philippines, and our clients and readers around the world, I’m pleased to give you my point of view on Thanksgiving. When you ask people in the U.S. what this holiday means to them, you most often hear about the turkey.  They can also wax poetic for hours about delicious pumpkin pie, green bean casserole, candied sweet potatoes and more.  Popular subjects of debate are the best recipe for dessert and the proper way to prepare the turkey itself (e.g., roasting versus deep frying). Rather than a superficial day dedicated to gorging on rich food, what most people are really talking about is how the annual dinner makes them feel and how it connects us.  The feasts are a representation of the time spent together, whether watching parades, playing touch football, cleaning up the dishes or even meeting each other unexpectedly at the fridge in the middle of the night for a sandwich of turkey leftovers.  Thanksgiving is not about giving gifts or even eating.  It’s about family and friends.