The holiday that expatriate Americans miss most?

Thanksgiving. And, from my experience, whatever holiday is second … isn’t close.

Fourth of July? Once you get past fireworks, you’re just missing some barbecue.  Christmas? It goes on pretty much everywhere (even here, it seems), though you might miss mom, dad and the cousins.

But Thanksgiving? It doesn’t really translate outside the borders of America. Which is a problem because nearly all Americans like Thanksgiving.

Which is why we are trying to concoct a Thanksgiving dinner … on Wednesday.

Thanksgiving often is difficult, outside the borders of the U.S. of A.

1. Nobody else celebrates it.

2. Some of the key ingredients to Thanksgiving ambience are absent. Specifically, family … and football. If you don’t have some special satellite plan, or a Slingbox, you’re not going to get the Cowboys. And then there are problems of time difference … the afternoon NFL game will kick off at 1 a.m. Friday here. So, is it Thanksgiving without football? It’s harder, for sure.The “early” game will start at 9:30 p.m. here.

3. Some of the key ingredients of Thanksgiving menus are very hard to find. Turkey, for example, appears to be eaten almost entirely in North America. You can find sliced turkey in some foreign postings. But a whole bird? You need a specialty shop, or a butcher with imagination. And cranberries and canned pumpkin and stuffing … not available in most of the world.

So, it’s a bit daunting. But Leah is a huge fan of Thanksgiving, and she offered to give it a try. The meal side of it anyway. And our friend Nancy Beth, who has a wonderful apartment (and a table that seats six) offered up her place … and, well, the planning is proceeding apace.

(We’re doing it Wednesday because Leah, who is doing most of the cooking, works on Thursday.  And, really, this far from home, we hardly know what day it is half the time, so we’ll just do it Wednesday and make believe it’s Thursday.)

A year ago, in Hong Kong, we just went to the Foreign Correspondents club because it has enough Americans hanging around that the kitchen goes ahead and does a turkey dinner. And does it pretty well, too. But there is no equivalent social organization here. Certainly not for reporters. So …

Two nights ago, we bought a frozen Butterball turkey of modest dimensions from a particularly Western (but more British than American) supermarket known as Spinney’s. It may be the only market in the city that is carrying turkeys. The other semi-Western-style market, Lulu’s, doesn’t have any turkeys. None.

Our turkey isn’t big; it weighs just shy of 12 pounds, which ought to work for 6-7 homesick Americans. We think.

We also found, in the same store, two boxes of Stove Top stuffing. Not like  grandma used to make, but this didn’t seem the time to stand on ceremony and demand made-from-scratch. Besides, we got the third-to-last and second-to-last boxes of Stove Top. We got some cubes for chicken broth. And some sugar for the cranberry relish.

A night later,  we bought a batch of potatoes that look like russets if you squint or the room is dark enough … as well as a potato peeler … as well as a potato masher (they don’t include potato mashers in your apart-hotel room) … as well as a plastic bag meant for a big chicken that might (just might) be big enough to cook our turkey in … and we also bought a glass dish big enough to put the bird in. Because when you’re an expat, you tend not to have a fully stocked kitchen.

Still to go … some dinner rolls, probably Tuesday … maybe some green beans.  And one of our co-workers at The National said he will bring pie. I have no idea where he will come up with pie; I don’t think 95 percent of the people in Abu Dhabi have ever seen a pie. But he says he will bring one, so …

Oh, and a “light red” wine to go with the turkey.  In the UAE, you can’t just run out and buy some wine. Muslim country, remember? But it so happens that one of the dinner guests Wednesday night is coming back into the country from France on Tuesday night, and you’re allowed to buy up to four bottles of wine at the duty-free store at the Abu Dhabi airport … and he has offered to get a couple bottles of a light red with his precious,  four-bottle allotment. We bought one bottle of champagne when we came into town, and we probably will pop that for a toast.

So, the basics are in place.  We have the ingredients, most of them. We have a venue with the table and chairs. We believe we have the spices and garnishes and bags and bowls and mashers … though we almost certainly have forgotten something. But I assume we will muddle through — if the rarely used oven works, and the turkey cooks as it should, and we do, in fact, have enough serving dishes …

On Wedneday. 6-7 of us will eventually gather around the table and have the most specifically American meal. Some of us will just have met. Others of us will have known each other only a few weeks. But we will be united in being Yanks far from home, determined to celebrate the most American of holidays … in the middle of Abu Dhabi.