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  • 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, "Hmm... 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.

  • But look at 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 [isn't], actually, a holiday in Canada and America -- until 1957.

  • One of the great, great people that works 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 these "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 fella.

  • 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. We 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, very popular in America is American football.

  • They have, on Thanksgiving, a big American football competition where guys run 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.

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

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