What do Baslers staring at foreigners on the tram & pies made out of tubers have in common? Auntie SAM answers all in this week’s delicious post.
Dear Auntie SAM: Evidently it is an invasion of personal space to make eye contact with Swiss people yet they don’t hesitate to stare bullet holes in you for merely bringing an odd-shaped object on the tram. Seems like a bit of a double standard and both are annoying. What are your thoughts ?
The most difficult thing I make at Thanksgiving is grape pie. An Amish tradition, made simpler by grapes only grown in the States, in Switzerland, carnage occurs before every pie’s end. From each tenderly plucked fruit, I separate skins & seeds from jubilantly jiggly flesh. Fingers sticky. My shirt stained. Tips under my nails bathing in nectar and aching. Only after I’ve suffered can I begin. I make & roll the dough. Cut it to shape. Embolden it with love. Then sprinkle a patchwork of dreams & fairy dust atop. Season with one lilting kiss (to taste). Nestle in a warm oven … allow to set; become.
Thanksgiving may have originated from the saddest & most horrible tragedy Auslanders ever brought to new soil; but, Darling, what else could have created American Spirit ? Billions of optimistic foreign blood buoyed by stalwart & knowing native blood transforming tragedy into our mini-Fasnacht: the most beautiful day of the year. Only in America would generations throughout an entire nation decide that genocide was the perfect time to learn how to make fascinating things with yams.
Because if you do not transform tragedy into something beautiful it remains tragic.
And why allow that, Darling, when you could have pie ?
My Thanksgiving memories from when I was a child still bring me warm feelings of love. Kind-hearted, witty & ornery aunts in the kitchen. Slightly tipsy uncles watching (real) football in the den 😉 In the best of years, we’d eat too much, laugh a lot, & play games or cards.
But my favorite Thanksgivings occurred without my relatives. In cities I hardly knew anyone. In homes I’d only see once. At Orphans’ Thanksgivings.
It’s simply a fact of American culture that, if you live at your parents’ house after 18 years old, you had better be gearing for marriage, a tough upper education, or life wearing a helmet at an institution. Because, if not for the first two, the latter (idiocy) will be assumed. [Ed. Note: Don’t even get your Auntie started on the first two.]
Regardless of resources or capabilities, teenagers depart with suitcases & rusted Yugos packed with dreams destined for foreign places. As such, Americans become Auslanders without ever leaving home. Meaning: that when things get tough, we get creative. Industrious. And we network as if our lives depend upon it … because they do. And every person in America knows this to be true about every American. Without having a safety net provided by a well-functioning government or family, each American is alone.
Except at Thanksgiving. Stories abound of restaurants offering free meals to anyone on Thanksgiving. Of otherwise conservative families opening their doors to or volunteering at homeless shelters. Of children & old men – each without a penny to spare – sharing tins of food. Even your Auntie & her Krazy Klub Kid friends looked forward to Thanksgiving as the day we got to treat each other & learn how to cook.
On this one day, each year, we get to express that we’re all in this together. So let’s roast & share a bird.
When a friend first moved to Basel, he told me he felt wildly – embarrassingly – conspicuous. Old women & children froze, mouths agape when they saw him. Little girls on trams hid behind their mothers. Drunk boys with seemingly low IQs taunted him & made gross assumptions about who he might be or believe. Publicly shamed as many things he is not – but none actually bad – he started to forget who he was. He started to hate who he is.
Often walking with his head low, shoulders slumped, a slow trod … with a heavy heart, one cold Swiss evening, he noticed a fragile looking old woman at the tram stop near his home. Deeply sighing, his face already reddening with shame, he instinctively started to steer clear of her so as not to scare her. Then she called to him. She asked, in dialect, if he would walk her home. „Of course“, he answered (in broken German), “Of course.“
Every culture has their way of accepting people. Every foreigner here has their way. Swiss people have their way, too. Their rules do not apply to you because they’re not meant for you. Rules are made by & for people in power: not you.
And, maybe it violates some sense of justice inside you. But, again, you’re not living in your world. You’re living in a world where, today, people are rather cared for because people they loved sacrificed & stuck by challenging decisions that benefitted Them — and us Us, too. Of course They are going to watch you closely, Sweet Darling.
I hope you brought pie.
XO
AS
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This FRIDAY FEAST on ARTISTIC ABUNDANCE — INDULGE IN DELIGHTS ….
SWOON to Brecht, Weill, Brel, & Piaf PLAYFULLY REMASTERED by NINA BRADLIN & TIFFANY BUTT into the BALLAD OF SEXUAL DEPENDENCY. Trattoria Bar da Sonny. 7:30 PM. Collection
SURROUND YOURSELF IN OPULENCE at the Pre-Opening CELEBRATION of EVA MARIA HERTWICH new artistic shop EVA’S HOME OF ART. Muenzgasse 3, 4051. 6 PM.
GENEROUSLY BENEFIT the GLUEKSKETTE REFUGEES at the CHARITY ART AUCTION hosted by BASEL’S OWN KLUB KID KING JEFF VON PHIL & featuring the art of FABIAN RISSO and others. Sponsored by BUCIO REPRESENTS in collaboration with the UNITARIAN UNIVERSALISTS OF BASEL. Lohnhof 8, 4051 (Tramstop Musik-Akademie). 7:30 PM.
CELEBRATE something you LOVE. And give THANKS. XO