Turkey and Thanksgiving

Food! These four letters making a word, believe it or not, symbolizes and means more than any other things combined in this world. For rich, food may mean something to satisfy the craving coming from within one’s body. For poor, it may mean a living done for survival. For other animals, it may also mean survival along with instinct. For insects it may mean a monotonous task that guides their instinct. But, for us humans, food symbolizes a much greater deal than any other species in this world. We not only use food to eat, but rather also use for celebrations, grieving, meetings, and for religious purposes along with many other things. One such celebration in which we enjoy our food is “Thanksgiving.”

Thanksgiving, which is celebrated on 25 November, is a festival where we not only celebrate the harvest season, but also share the concept of sharing and helping each other out. There are no definite origins of thanksgiving, but historians assume thanksgiving to predate 16^th century. It is believed that thanksgiving originated from England. When the colonists founded America, they brought this culture with them. However, the name was particularly given in America. There were many foods that were consumed on this festival. But, what better to justify a festivity than to share a fat and juicy turkey where the main moral is the concept of sharing.

Turkeys were initially a game bird, because of its speed, which were hunted by the Aztecs. They became domesticated in the late 1600’s. There are many breeds of Turkeys, including domesticated and wild ones. These days’ turkeys are specially bred for their meaty breasts. When the pilgrims arrived in America, they liked turkey so much that they took some with them to Spain. But today, America is the only country that eats more turkey than any other nation. In fact, Sir George Washington Loved it so much that he wanted turkey to be the national bird of our country. It has also been the case that turkeys were eaten along with tortillas among Hopi Indians. So, when the first thanksgiving was done in 1620’s, there were many other foods that were feasted upon. For example, lobsters, deer, goose, seal and many others. Then, why did turkey become so attached with the modern Thanksgiving? Was it the size or the taste? Or perhaps other foods became scarce?

So, the answer is that not only other food became more scarce and the turkeys were big enough to feed a whole family, but also that they were massively being domesticated, which led to a substantial supply of turkey in modern America. As thanksgiving is a holiday where people share and give their thanks to other people and to god, what better meal can there be to share than a big turkey? It is also believed that when the pilgrims came to America, they could only find turkey to go around among many people for harvest festival. Nonetheless, there are many other stories relating turkey and thanksgiving.

But no matter how many stories we have for thanks giving, in the end, it really doesn’t matter whether you share a turkey, a lobster, a cow or a broccoli in thanksgiving or any other festival. What really matters is that we are sharing, which may very well, one day, lead to a better world- a world where people not only share food, but also share love, kindness and hope.