Ushuaia - Fin del Mundo

Ushuaia is the southernmost city in Argentina hence the name...end of the world. It sits on the Beagle Channel and Chile is a stone throw away. Anartica is a couple hours away. I spent two weeks here learning Spanish. I am really not sure I learned too much more however it is so beautiful I really did not mind. My housemates were a guy from France, Gerard, who spoke little Spanish (with a very thick French accent and no English) and Tia (aunt) Maria who lives in the casa and makes my desayuno (breakfast) which consists of the typical south american breakfast of Pan(bread), jelly and coffee (Nescafe -however she makes REAL coffee for me ;) con leche (hot milk). God I would kill for an egg mcmuffin.
Gerard and I actually went out to dinner. Because he speaks very little Spanish (w/a thick French accent) and no English and I speak very little Spanish and French for that matter, it was a comical conversation. The waitress, who spoke English and Spanish translated half of our conversation and was laughing at us the whole time. She ended up having some wine with us.
Ushaia sits at the bottom of Glacier Martial. I hiked up there one day, had some glacier water which was very nice and then a nice bowl of pumkin soup! Yum. Ushuaia also is near of Tierra del Fuego National Park. It was awesome. There are so many trails and long hikes (my knees do not like me) and it is where the end of Ruta 3 ends which runs the whole of Argentina. I actually could spend another week here.
I was here for Thanksgiving. No one here has or had been to a "USA" thanksgiving (I can no longer say American because we are ALL Americano here) dinner.
I HAD to remedy this. One problem I have NEVER done this before by myself. Who am I kidding I never have. Of course I have helped with a wonderful side dish or two. Normally I am in charge of decor. Bless Google and my family who helped me through this.
They actually do have Pavo (Turkey) here, albeit only one size, but it did the job. I was making dinner for 8ppl. Thank god patatas (potatoes) are big here. Herbs and spices another matter. They do not seem to add anything to anything. The mashed potatoes (patatas trituradas) are pretty bland here, so of course everyone was in for a surprise with what I was going to make.
I did a very basic "USA" Thanksgiving. Normally in my family we have very extravagant dishes but since this was their first...Igiv`em a good ole meat and potatoes dinner with some stuffing. (Never heard or had cranberries here so none of that).
Menu: Butternut Squash Soup to start (IT was OUTSTANDING if I do say so myself), Turkey, Stuffing (two kinds one with meat one without -we had one vegetarian which is rare in these parts), TWO kinds of patats triturdas; garlic and sweet potatoes w honey, grilled asparagus with a light balsamic reduction and of course pan(bread). ALL this was made with 3 pots, and one pan for the turkey). The turkey was cooked in an oven that had NO temperatures only two icons a big and little flame. Everywhere on Google: "it is very important when cooking a turkey to keep it at a certain temperature". Whatever...I stuck it in there and hoped for the best. The dessert was made by Ana the woman who owns the school (and the house I lived in for two weeks and who drank wine with me practically every night...no I am not losing any weight on this trip...I wonder why?): Choco torte, it is made with the staple "Dulce de leche". It is sold in the stores here and it is sooo good (hmmmm stocking stuffer?). The Frenchie of course brought the Champagne and everyone else vino.
By 9pm everything was ready to go...9 PM you say? Yep. Actually the normal time to eat dinner is 10pm, they made an exception for this special night.
They had many questions about what I did, what was normal etc...and how Thanksgiving came to be. Why ask me? I am an "American".
Do we all know the story of Thanksgiving and how it came to be? No...GOOGLE IT. That is what I did and then I Babel fished it for the Spanish translation...oh yeah I looked really good. It is actually not what I thought. Especially on how it came to be on the last Thursday in November, politicians, gotta love em.
Then I told them that my family normally holds hands and goes around the table and says what they are most thankful for...I should have explained that this is normally just a few things and what you are MOST thankful for. 30min later, the soup is cold and needs to be reheated. I am not really sure what they said or what they were thankful for because it was all in Spanish. However, I think they really got into it and were very happy to share.
Dinner actually went off without a hitch. Turkey was muy perfecto. Finally at 12AM we were ready to have dessert and Champagne. By 2:30 am the wine was all gone and I had to get up for school at 8am, luckily my professor was drinking as much as I was so I told him I did not do my homework (tarear) and I would be late for class the next day. No problema.
Next stop is El Calafate and El Cheltan for some more hiking.