La Vida en Costa Rica: "The Best Costa Rican Thanksgiving Ever"

Well as Amber put it, yesterday was "the best Costa Rican Thanksgiving ever." And it really was. We ended up with most of the work, but it was fair since we do have the full kitchen- plus we liked doing it anyway. We started buying the food last week sometime. We were going for 100% American. Amber and I were in charge of the corn, stuffing, green bean casserole, pumpkin pie and pumpkin cake. Randall and his girlfriend did the mashed potatoes and cranberries. The two newer Americans Matt and Nick bought 4 chickens, drinks and ice and then our other neighbor brought bread and macaroni and cheese. Here's what we had to start:

However, we were still missing a few key ingredients- a pie crust and whipped cream. We went to four stores before finding them. I couldnt find a regular pie crust so I used a graham cracker one, and Amber did finally find the Reddi-Wip. Here's the cake and pie (which didn't look this bad in person, and were very delicious):

And everyone knows the best part about a green bean casserole is the crunchy onions that go on top- but they do not exist here in Costa Rica and we couldn't just forget about them. SO I cut up an onion, dipped the rings in egg yolk, rolled them flour/seasoning and fried them. Then chopped them up and baked them to make them crunchier....the outcome? Well they weren't like the onions from the can but they made a really good substitute! Here's the girls hanging out in the kitchen waiting for the chicken to arrive:

I love this picture! This is everyone in line at the buffet getting their food. We actually estimated everything just about perfectly. We had just a little bit of left overs and everyone was full from the dinner:

Post Thanksgiving- Here are the dishes that were left to wash. Fortunately it was a lot less than originally expected because we asked everyone to bring their own plates, cups and silverware:

Ok so after dinner we decided to go bowling- 6 of us anyway. Well, we ran to catch the bus because it was almost 9pm and the buses don't come as often at night and we got on and it was pretty crowded. Matt & Nick didn't want to go all the way to the back because of the people who were there- and told me not to make eye contact. Well at the next stop some yelling started back there and then someone was going out the backdoor and hit a guy in the back of the head before he got off, then some more yelling and then there were a couple guys punching this guy on the back row- and a poor little old man was stuck next to them, he got over in the corner as much as possible. Well then the bus driver puts the bus in park (and a couple of the guys got off but one guy was still hitting the guy in the back row) well the driver works his way down the asile through all of us and starts yelling at them telling them if they want to fight to get off the bus and then the guy who was hitting starts apologizing and shakes hands with the bus driver, but the guy being hit keeps yelling and the bus driver shoves him but that guy sat down and we were on our way again. Well the guy who got hit in the back of the head starts yelling at the guys out the - window before we roll away = manana! manana! saying hed find them tomorrow...well then when we're down the street that guy started going crazy (this was when I got scared because I was only a couple rows in front of him) But he starts screaming saying that he wants off and for his friend not to hold him down or hed punch him and was literally crazy. Well the bus driver stops the bus again and makes them get off and the one guy who was on the back row crosses the street but is yelling at the driver causing a big scene outside...but when we pulled away from that stop it was all over. A nice ending to Thanksgiving =) Anyway! We went bowling and for 2 hours plus our shoes it was only about $6 per person, which was cool. But here are some pictures of us bowling:
Judging by the ball this one looks like a strike: