On Nov 24, 2004, at 18:50, Bev Walker wrote:
Yes, I do know we still have the Thanksgiving hurdle to tackle (I assume the Canadians are over that pain; my understanding is y'all celebrate a week earlier than we do...
in the month previous, and 6 weeks earlier ;)
Thanks to all Canadians - Bev, Heather and Rose-Marie (privately) who'd straightend me out on that one :)
Thanksgiving is not a holiday I grew up with, so I've only ever paid scant attention to it - no more than I *had to* (like going to the bank and PO a day before or forget it till Friday following). In Poland of my childhood and teens, we had something like "harvest festival" ("dozynki" - gathering of last strands of grain), but we all thought it was something contrived by the Communist government seeking to promote the "rule of workers and peasants" and, since it didn't intrude on every-day life (nothing closed) it was easy to ignore. I don't even remember when it was celebrated... Late September?
The first I knew that Canada celebrated Thanksgiving at all, and that it celebrated at an earlier date (explained by a colder climate and earlier harvest) was in '88, when I was in Oxford (UK). My Canadian neighbour in the faculty apartments threw me into a total panic, when she said she was going shopping for Thanksgiving dinner... And me not even beginning to think about it... :)
As we grow older, time flies faster, since every day (week, month, year) is a proportionally smaller part of one's past life (a year at 5, vs a year at 55). The "telescoping" of 6 weeks into one, over 15 yrs can, I think, be excused <g>
I have a letter c. 1880 written by a Canadian ancestor to his
grandchildren, describing Christmas c. 1830. There was no mention of a tree, nor presents
The first mentions of either (tree or presents) I can remember from Poland are around 1800 - when the Romantics swept through the literary scene. So, earlier than England, but later than early US, and there was a good excuse for it too, since a big chunk of Poland had been "partitioned" (appropriated) by the Germans and the Austrians, and since there had been a sizeable German influence on the Russians (the third participant of "partitions") since, I think, Peter the Great.
BTW, someone sent me some info on Polish Christmas customs, which said they differed in different parts of the country. They sure did, but the website never mentioned the one I grew up with - that the gifts were brought by the First Star of 24th. A subtle reminder that the same star announced the "gift to mankind" of the baby Jesus (if one's beliefs go that way). Nevertheless, the gifts were dropped off under the tree, not under a stable trough... :)
This branch of the family had immigrated to what is now Ontario, from the US, along with others in the wave of U.E.L. type people. Prior to that they 'worked' for the British defending something in Germany. They had a choice - stay Brit and go west (to NA) or switch allegiance to Russia. My branch elected to take the ships.
Does this help?
Helps to get me even more confused/intrigued :)
What's "U.E.L. type people"? And what were the Brits doing in *Germany*, in 18th c? And never mind the Brit/Russian choice - the only case of that I can think of is the Crimea, and that's later (I think)...
--- Tamara P Duvall http://lorien.emufarm.org/~tpd Lexington, Virginia, USA (Formerly of Warsaw, Poland)
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