Fourth of July with some South African Flair

From India to Azerbaijan to Ghana, it is becoming surprisingly normal for me to celebrate the independence of the United States while not actually being in the United States.  Last year was my first time being back in a while and I took the opportunity to throw a BBQ in my backyard as to me, July 4^th really is just a great excuse to have a BBQ.  Virgil, having been the grill-master at last year’s festivities, knew how much I love my Fourth of July BBQ and promised to give me a good South African braai (BBQ) this year.  It being winter in South Africa, the weather did not exactly cooperate (although from what I’ve heard, the weather wasn’t exactly on board for Fourth of July in MA either!), but Virgil wouldn’t let that dampen our celebration!  We brought his family’s gas grill into the garage and cooked up a braai fit for kings!... which I suppose is slightly inappropriate phrasing given that the Fourth of July celebrates our independence from the British king… but you get the idea.

Pork chops, steak, pork sausage, beef sausage, grilled sandwiches, and salads - man that was a lot of food!

Virgil, in a particularly silly mood a few weeks back, had specifically requested Fourth of July appropriate apparel, so I brought him an Old Navy flag t-shirt, which he proudly (he might disagree with my choice of adverb) wore the whole evening.  In addition to the typical South African grill-ables, Virgil bought what was labeled as a “Texas Steak” and, true to the stereotype that everything is bigger in Texas, this steak was a whopping like 3 pounds (for only about $8! Love these South African prices!).  Virgil would cut off little strips of the steak to cook up while everything else was grilling and so we were snacking the entire time we were cooking – which of course resulted in us being completely defeated by the massive amount of meat we had prepared when we actually sat down to eat.  There are worse things :)  And I did still manage to eat a piece of the apple crumble we had bought a little bit later.  It only felt appropriate.

V cutting the Texas steak... already a few strips down and that thing is still massive!

On a less culinarily-focused note, being abroad for the Fourth of July generally makes me think a bit more thoroughly about what we as Americans are actually celebrating as I have to explain the holiday to the non-Americans around me.  It's always a bit of a conflicted moment for me because, while I can certainly be very patriotic at times, when I'm abroad I frequently get asked to defend and explain US policies which I not only don't support, but I completely oppose.  For this Fourth of July, I took the time to read Frederick Douglass's speech from 1852 "What to a Slave is the Fourth of July?"  My adviser Helena has been recommending it to me for about the past year and I hadn't gotten around to reading it.  While of course it is written about slavery which has long been abolished in the United States, I think that it you could substitute in a host of other policies and practices of the United States government today and the speech would still be quite relevant.  So, for those of you winding up your patriotic festivities for the year who want to check it out, here is a link to it:

Frederick Douglass's "What to a Slave is the Fourth of July?"

And for those of you who don't want to read the whole thing, a small excerpt to think about what we are celebrating and how we are living up to the legacy we proclaim to be a part of:

We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and to the future.  To all inspiring motives, to noble deeds which can be gained from the past, we are welcome.  But now is the time, the important time.  Your fathers have lived, died, and have done their work, and have done much of it well.  You live and must die, and you must do your work. You have no right to enjoy a child's share in the labor of your fathers, unless your children are to be blest by your labors.  You have not right to wear out and waste the hard-earned fame of your fathers to cover your indolence.  Sydney Smith tells us that men seldom eulogize the wisdom and virtues of their fathers, but to excuse some folly or wickedness of their own.  This truth is not a doubtful one.  There are illustrations of it near and remote, ancient and modern.  It was fashionable, hundreds of years ago, for the children of Jacob to boast, we have "Abraham to our father," when they had long lost Abraham's faith and spirit.  That people contented themselves under the shadow of Abraham's great name, while they repudiated the deeds which made his name great.  Need I remind you that a similar thing is being done all over this country to-day?  Need I tell you that the Jews are not the only people who built the tombs of the prophets, and garnished the sepulchres of the righteous?  Washington could not die till he had broken the chains of his slaves.  Yet his monument is built up by the price of human blood, and the traders in the bodies and souls of men shout - "We have Washington to our father." - Alas! That it should be so; yet so it is.