Thanksgiving: What is it?

Good afternoon. Good evening. Good morning. Depends on when you're watching this. Thank

you for watching. I'm going to teach you about Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving is a holiday that is exclusive to North America. Oh, except Mexico. So it's

exclusive to Canada and America. You may be wondering, "How is Canada and America even

different?" Well, we have a lot of things that are different, the first one being the

dates of Thanksgiving. In Canada, Thanksgiving is the second Monday in October. Get your

calendars out. I didn't look at what date the second Monday was in October was, but

look on your calendar, "First Monday, no. Second Monday, yes." So in Canada we celebrate

Thanksgiving the second Monday in October. In America, however, it's closer to Christmas.

It's one -- almost one month away from Christmas, which is December 25th, for your information.

In America, it's celebrated the fourth Thursday in November, or you can think of it as the

last Thursday in November. I actually looked this up. This year being 2013, it's actually

November 28th. So if you live in America, on November 28th it is Thanksgiving. If you

live in Canada, it will be the second Monday in October.

Interesting little tidbit of history for you: We didn't officially have a Thanksgiving holiday

-- and it is, actually, a holiday in Canada and America -- until 1957. One of the great,

great people that work at the parliament buildings decided to give us a holiday in October, and

it happened in 1957. It was official that the second Monday in October would be Thanksgiving.

In America, this happened a long, long time ago. From the information that I've seen,

it actually happened in 1863 with this guy named Abraham Lincoln. Have you heard of this

guy? He was the president of America around this time, and he made this a holiday.

So what is Thanksgiving? Basically, it is to say thanks. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you

for giving -- what? Thanksgiving. What happened was a lot of people left Europe and came and

settled in Canada and America. These people were called "pilgrims". People -- also called

them "settlers". So these people came from Europe and lived in Canada or North America.

They had nothing. So they planted seeds. They produced their own food. Luckily, they actually

were able to grow in the soil in Canada and America, and they gave thanks for the harvest.

And as I've seen -- because Abraham Lincoln seemed to be a religious fellow -- he would

give thanks to God. Who's God? I don't know. So it is actually -- in America, at this time,

it was kind of a religious thing that they would give thanks to God for giving them food.

In Canada, however, in 1957, we were just very happy to have a harvest. And "harvest"

means food. You spend a lot of your time planting seeds, watering seeds, growing the seeds.

It's time to eat that. And that's called a "harvest".

What do we do? What do we do on Thanksgiving? Well, we eat food. We eat food that is grown

specifically, or ready specifically in October. This includes things like squash or turnip

or pumpkin. I'll draw you a picture. I'm not really good at drawing pictures of fruit -- but

turnip or squash. We also have potatoes. I love potatoes. And the main food that we have

in Thanksgiving is a big turkey. Now, maybe you've never seen or had a turkey before.

It looks like a chicken, except it's really, really much bigger and, in my opinion, not

as tasty. Traditionally, for Thanksgiving, we're going to have a turkey dinner with seasonal

vegetables and gravy. Also very, very, very, very popular in America

is American football. They have, on Thanksgiving, a big American football competition where

guys running around in spandex hug each other, throw a ball -- fun times. And food, food,

food. The other thing that they celebrate more in America than in Canada is they have

parades. In New York City, they will have a Thanksgiving Day parade where people will

dress up like pilgrims or settlers and maybe turkeys, and they would walk and celebrate

the harvest in New York City. "That sounds strange." It's true.

Do you have a holiday like this in your country that you celebrate the harvest in October

or November? I think you might. Subscribe to my YouTube channel, EnglishLessons4U, and

let me know about your holiday of the harvest. Goodbye. Happy eating and Thanksgiver.