Thursday November 22, Thanksgiving. We got up early and took the train into Rome. We attended 10:30 mass at Santa Susanna. This is the American church in Rome. Mass was in English. Everybody there spoke English. The representative of the US ambassador read a proclamation from President Obama. It was all very American like. We sang America the Beautiful. We even had American coffee and pastries after mass.

Danilo had arranged for an expatriate chef from America to fix the dinner. I was little skeptical, but it turned out wonderfully. Everything tasted like home with turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, and even pumpkin pie. In addition there was pumpkin soup, sweet potatoes, pecan and apple pies. We had a feast that lasted for hours. I want to get her recipe for seasoning the turkey. It was delicious.

Besides the students, Amy, Danilo, Mike and I, we also invited the brothers, their families, Brandon's family and the Italian instructor and her husband. We had 32 people for dinner. Brandon's grandmother and I carved the turkeys. There are pictures floating around somewhere. I will try and find them and post them.