We didn’t miss the holiday, after all. Well, we were a day late. But it was the thought that counted.

We made our way south of Abu Dhabi Island and found the home of an American family who played host to about 25 people,  some of whom (like us) they didn’t even know.

The way it happened … the people in whose big apartment house we stayed for a couple of months while they were traveling in Spain and the U.S. during the summer … know the people who hosted the Thanksgiving Day-after meal, and we were invited by the people we know to join them at the home of the people we don’t know. Got that?

It was a bit of the serious expat experience. It was far too big a group (and we arrived a bit too late, after our cabbie got lost) to talk to everyone, but it seemed as if the preponderance of people there were Americans or Canadians, most of them in their 30s, who had been overseas for quite some time. These are people who have real homes with a lot of their stuff in them, and their kids with them, attending local schools. Settling in for a long haul and connecting with other expats because they have no idea when they might go “home” but it likely will not be soon. One couple had been all over the region for something like eight years. Another were new to Abu Dhabi after 13 years in Istanbul.

Like that.

The hosts live in a new development up against a long inlet off the Gulf, a strip of neat condominiums along the water, and with their very own Spinneys (the local British-style grocery-store chain) inside the neighborhood. In theory, spouses who don’t work probably may not have to leave their neighborhood for long stretches of time. Weeks, maybe, unless they have to go pick up the kids from an American-style school.

Unlike where we live, in a modest villa in a very ethnically mixed and income-varied neighborhood, I suspect that every person inside the walls of where we were last night is a Westerner.

The one aspect of the evening that I found a little unsettling was getting to the place. We drove past some of the more dilapidated housing we have seen in the emirate, overflowing with the single men from nearby countries who are generically known as “laborers” … and then 100 yards later we were outside the tidy new tract, where the entrance is monitored by a guard in a shack who operates the bars that go up and down to allow vehicles in and out.

The juxtapositioning of the third-world (fourth-world?) conditions outside, where 50 guys were trying to get out of a beat-up bus, and the “little bit of suburbia” on the inside of the gates … well, it was jarring.

It was a very nice place. The development appears to be all two-story condos, but of some size. We didn’t tour the house, but it had a spacious living room, a dining room with a big table, a kitchen half the size of where we live now and an office, on the ground floor. Plus a big swath of real grass in the backyard, along with a stretch of patio and, as I recall, a barbecue. Must be at least two bedrooms upstairs, because the host couple have a child and, it seems, a live-in housekeeper. Aside from the housekeeper, the home had the same look and feel and decor of a neighborhood in Anywhere, USA. It felt American, especially this time of year, when the heat is turned down and sitting outside is a legitimate option.

It appeared that everyone who came brought something. A Thanksgiving potluck. We brought roasted vegetables and a pumpkin pie. The table was covered with tons of food. More than enough for another dozen people,  at least.

I had dark-meat turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy. Pretty thoroughly Thanksgiving-ish. We sat on the grass, our legs crossed, and ate off sturdy paper plates and were quite content. We chatted with the sculptor and writer from the States (but who live in Istanbul now) who are staying with our friends who own the big apartment, and with two Canadians who have been all over the region. They have lived in (and not just visited) countries from Morocco to Kuwait to Afghanistan and now Abu Dhabi in the UAE. The husband works for a shipping firm; the wife is in HR with a local company.

The husband declared the “Middle East is where it’s happening” and went on to add that the UAE was by far the best place to be in the region. More organized. More functional. A nicer place to live.

The host is, I believe, an executive with a construction firm, and the UAE is still the place to be for that sort of guy. To drive south of Abu Dhabi Island is to see towers, villas, condos going up on both sides of the highway for miles. And further into the desert are even more projects. The emirate of Abu Dhabi, remember, is floating on oil.

We had a nice chat with the artists and the Canadians, and Leah was pleased to have turkey because Thanksgiving is her favorite holiday. The only quasi-formal point of the evening was when our host stood up, with the three women who had organized the event, and thanked everyone for coming, and noted that “when you’re far away from home, your friends become your family.” Which is true. I mean, what are the options? Staying at home and moping about being stranded?

Everyone clapped for the host and his wife and the others who had been key to organizing the event.

A bit later, the woman who lives in the big apartment encouraged people to come into the living room and talk about their thoughts on Thanksgiving,  2010, as she recorded them on a video camera. She is a videographer who has done some television work for HGTV.

We sat down and did our bit. One of those “what do you feel thankful/good about?” moments. For posterity. Leah mentioned the ability to gather with other North Americans, people who opened their home to us, and enjoy the warmth of a Thanksgiving meal. I mentioned how I was glad that Leah had a chance to do this, because Thanksgiving is so important to her, and it’s when she misses her family most. And I was afraid it might cause her to tear up, and it did … and we finished our video session about then, and the videographer got up and gave her a hug. I suppose it showed the stresses of being far away and how you might like to believe you have them tamped down and under control, but there they are,  just below the surface, and it’s OK if they bubble to the surface now and then.

Two years ago, we did a Thanksgiving-ish meal at the Foreign Correspondents Club in Honk Kong. A year ago, Leah cooked for six people in the kitchen of our friend Nancy Beth downtown. This year, we were out in the ‘burbs of Abu Dhabi. All of them fun and comforting in their own way.

Someday, we would like to spend a Thanksgiving back home. We don’t yet see ourselves as career expats. Maybe we just haven’t grasped the reality yet … but maybe something will come up and someday we can be back with family, and not just really nice friends … and friends of friends.