It’s that time of year again. The holidays are officially here and it’s time to head home and feast. Thanksgiving break is a time to reunite with friends, family and loved ones, and to discuss the previous months of school. I always look forward to Thanksgiving break because it is the first time since the summer my home friends and I can get together, have a big reunion, spend all night catching up, and eat our favorite meals from home. This holiday is all about Friendsgiving fun, and the traditions that come along with it!
Since our freshmen year of college, my home friends and I have planned a Friendsgiving dinner every year. But we don’t eat your typical Thanksgiving foods, we make this event our own.
I am one of those few people that doesn’t LOVE the typical Thanksgiving feast because I usually only eat two things from the traditional meal-- turkey and mashed potatoes. This is one of the reasons why when we celebrate as friends, we make sure to change it up and prepare our own favorite meals.
Since my friends and I all come from different backgrounds, we like to share food from our different cultures. My friend Deanna, for example, is Italian, and she always manages to make the most unreal Italian entree. Whether it's chicken parmesan, baked ziti, or cavatelli with broccoli, she always manages to wow us with her restaurant-like cooking.
My friend Katie makes paella with her Abuela, and she always includes various types of meat and seafood in this dish. Lastly, my friend Nicole brings Matzoh Ball Soup from our favorite local Jewish deli. I, on the other hand, tend to make something a little more simple-- whether it's fruit salad, chocolate-covered strawberries, or guacamole, I keep it pretty basic and easy in my kitchen. Our other friends make appetizers and desserts.
When thinking about Friendsgiving and the upcoming holiday, I asked my college friends their opinion and how they spend time reuniting with their friends.
Everyone celebrates the Thanksgiving holiday differently. Dianna Devito, a current Junior at Syracuse University claims that “holidays are something [she] always [looks] forward to and it gives [her] the opportunity to make [her] famous Baked Ziti dish for all of [her] friends. It’s usually gone 0.5 seconds after [she sets] it down on the table.”
Current Junior, Olivia Rose, however, celebrates by making “a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, cranberry sauce and all," but her favorite part are the reunions.
She explained that this holiday makes us all realize how much we have truly missed each other and how much we had missed out on in each other’s lives over the three-month period in between summer and Thanksgiving break.
I think our generation is all about taking old traditions and making them our own. I look forward to this yearly Friendsgiving celebration shared with my home friends, and I am counting down the seconds until it is time for our annual reunion.