Harvest Moon
Some of Piston Peak's Air Attack Teams traditions ebbed and flowed according to subtle shifts in the calendar. Their celebration of the autumn Moon Festival was one of those events that was in constant flux depending on which date it fell on the date that the harvest moon fell on.
In many years it fell in September and it was one of the last celebrations that the whole crew got to participate in before Dipper, Patch, and the Smokejumpers contracts ended on October 1st. When the celebration fell in September Cabbie, Maru, and Blade would take turns organizing the food for that evening's feast.
When it was Cabbie's turn, he would always order a spread from his favorite Korean restaurant. He would always make sure there was a steaming pot of Tohrangook, a clear nutty broth made from taro and tendon, to help fill up the smokejumpers before the more expensive delicacies were placed on the table. He also made sure that at the end of the meal there was a large plate of Songpyeon...little halfmoon shaped, rice cakes filled with red beans or honey to give the feast a proper sweet finish. The meal that took place between the first and last course was left up to the restaurant. Due to years of Cabbie's generous tipping, the spread was always a joy for the senses.
When it was Maru's turn, the tug would badger one of his cousins in San Francisco to put together bento boxes filled with dango (little rice dumplings), tempura sweet potatoes, rice balls, and roasted chestnuts. If the weather would allow, Maru would spread blankets out on the base's apron once it got dark to set up for a proper Otsukimi. The entire team would sit under the star sky eating, laughing, and letting their breath billow in puffs of steam in the chill autumn's evening air.
When it was Blade's turn, he would usually just do a Panda Express run. He would order several of the big catering trays of several of the dishes and spread them out on the big-serving table. Everyone on base was asked to be conservative on how much they put on their plate the first time through the buffet so everyone had a chance to snag a little of everything, but all bets were off when it was time for seconds. The helicopter always tried to order more than he thought they needed...but he had yet to be any leftovers from one of his moon festivals.
Regardless of who was grabbing the food the party would usually last late into the night...a celebration of everything they had done that year and a welcome break from the stresses of preparing base for the long alpine winter.
If the Moon Festival fell in early October, the event had a little bit different meaning. Instead of being the last big hurrah with the full team. It was the first big point of the calendar that was only celebrated by the Base's permanent residences. As a result, the celebration had a very different feel and a very different purpose.
Unlike the large, September feasts, the three vehicles left on base each played a specific role in preparing for the evening's event. Blade's role was to procure a Moon Cake, a rich pastry filled with red bean or lotus paste and cured egg yolk. It was a role he took very seriously and he usually ordered a double yoke cake just large enough for the three of them weeks in advance to be delivered by mail.
Maru would spend the entire day of the festival doing last-minute fall cleaning and base winterizing. While many of these tasks had been completed by smokejumpers before they left, there were simply some things that Maru wasn't going to trust the ground pounders with. Once everything was to the mechanic's standards he would start pulling out equipment that would be needed for the evening's festivities. There were the three nested bowls, each one unique to its owner, and the sake set which after years of use Blade had learned to ignore for the evening. Finally, there was the cutting board that would only come out for this festival. With care, Maru would place this year's Moon Cake on the cutting board, then, satisfied with his work he would head out to the tarmac to wait with Blade for the last piece of the festivities to arrive.
As always, as the sky began to change from blue to the pinks and purples of a deepening sunset, Cabbie would appear on the horizon carrying the evening's meal. Making a precise approach, he would gingerly break and stop in front of Maru and Blade before popping his hatch. Once his beaver tail was open, the reason for the old plane's precise flying was evident with the smell of rich broth walfed in the breeze and the stack of different tupperware containers in the hold.
Unlike all of the other Moon Festival feasts, this meal was not prepared by a restaurant. Instead, it was a meal prepared in the home kitchen of a Vietnamese Officer and friend that Cabbie had helped evacuate to the United States in the wake of the Vietnam War. Shortly after they had gained US citizenship, their family had invited Cabbie to share a Moon festival meal with them and the plane had particularly enjoyed the Saigon style pho that had been served. To this day they had insisted on making it for him at least once a year, just like Cabbie still insisted on getting their children and now grandchildren gifts for Christmas.
Maru would unload the containers and hall them inside Cabbie's hanger with practiced ease. Then the tug would divide the food between the three bowls, with the largest portion going into Cabbie's massive dish and the smallest portion in his own bowl. With each tine full of ingredients the smell in the hanger became more and more irrisabile until the last scoop of fresh herbs was added and everyone could dive into their pho.
The act of consuming the soup had a ritual all of its own. First, there was the deep inhale of steam then a tentative sip to judge the temperature of the broth. This was of course followed by large gulps so large that an outsider would have a hard time seeing how the three vehicles managed to breath between them. Only once each of them was nearly completely full, did they slow to a more leisurely pace of eating and conversation resumed as they chased the last bits of noodle around their bowls. Then the evening always ended with Cabbie and Maru sipping sake to cut the richness of the moon cake while Blade worked on his own can of low grade.
Tomorrow, everyone would work on cleaning the containers so that Cabbie could return them to their owner, but for now, all three vehicles would sleep content and ready to take on whatever the winter months would throw at them.