For Thanksgiving Break, we only got Thursday and Friday off, so the break was way shorter than the week long high school break I’m used to. Some classes were canceled on Wednesday as well, but sadly none of mine were. So I went to all my classes and left Wednesday afternoon for the long 4 day weekend (after leaving all my food with my friend that stayed over the weekend because the dining hall closed)!!
My Thanksgiving Break was pretty uneventful to say the least. My family doesn’t do the big family dinner like in the movies so there was no rush to cook massive amounts of food or get table settings ready the night before. Thanksgiving honestly felt like any other day to me. This year, however, we tried to be more Thanksgivingy and got a rotisserie chicken and pumpkin pie from Costco for dinner! Probably the closest to Thanksgiving dinner I’ve ever gotten. We eat dinner together every night, so it was nothing special but it was still nice to get a day off to spend with my family. We also don’t do the mad rush for Black Friday sales so Thursday night was pretty chill. Basically, Thanksgiving break was just a long weekend for me, but much appreciated after the wave of midterms.
I did eat my weight in Korean barbeque at Gen in Fullerton Friday night though. I’ve been craving it for weeks and I finally got to go. My family eats a lot, especially when it comes to all you can eats, so we stayed there for the full two hour limit and they actually had to come nicely kick us out lol. Just to put in perspective how much my family of five actually ate, here are some numbers: 70 pieces of beef tongue, 20 pieces of rib meat, 39 pieces of galbi (beef short ribs), 30 pieces of flat iron steak, and three plates of garlic calamari just to name a few along with plenty of side dishes. Impressed? I know our server sure was.
But anyways, not sure if you guys remember, but I live on campus in Valimar in Middle Earth even though I only live 20 minutes away. Also, I go home almost every weekend, so going home is a normal thing for me and UCI’s environment isn’t that different from home. However, being at home for more than just a weekend was really weird. Even though I was in the same home I grew up in, everything feels different and after the second day, I started to miss my dorm.
Over the past quarter, my dorm started to become my home. During break, I missed the familiar faces I saw in the hall everyday. I missed the couch on the second floor common room I always curl up with my blanket in to take my 1 AM power naps. I missed walking down the hall to see my best friend. I missed seeing my RA when I leave to go to class. I missed all the small things that started to make Valimar home. It’s weird because I left my dorm to go “home,” but ended up missing my dorm home and dorm family. (Fun fact: my phone saved Valimar as home) I am so grateful for both my homes and both my families.