As cold weather sets in, students anticipate a brief respite in the form of upcoming vacations. Thanksgiving holiday and Winter Break beckon students to traditional holiday feasts and loved ones.
Many University students, staff and faculty are gearing up for holiday trips back home, while others will make Ann Arbor their home for the holidays.
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| LOUIS BROWN/Daily Ann Arbor's S. State Street is decorated for the holiday season. Some students will stay around Ann Arbor for the holidays, while others will head home to celebrate the season with family and friends. |
"I plan to eat at Thanksgiving, open gifts at Christmas, light candles at Kwanza and be with my girlfriend on New Year's," Irving said.
The time off and away from the pressures of school can be just as thrilling for students as the holiday festivities.
"It's exciting because I can't stand school, and there's no school, no studying and no homework," he said.
Rockville, Maryland is the destination for LSA first-year student Jeff Goldberg.
"Going home excites me," Goldberg said. "My family celebrates Hanukkah. We exchange gifts, light the menorah and the remembrance candle."
The remembrance candle is a 24-hour candle lit in respect for those who have died, he said. But times have changed as he and his brothers have grown up, Goldberg said.
"It's getting different now," Goldberg said. "Now that we are all getting older, we don't always get to see each other for the holidays. It's disappointing and sad."
Music first-year student Christina Shay looks forward to going home so she can participate in a popular longtime tradition.
"My friends at home and I like to go caroling," Shay said. "We started about two years ago. It was just something we felt like trying, and it was pretty cool.
People will actually try to offer us cookies and things," she said.
Law first-year student Jasmine Abdel-Khalik, who is planning to fly home to Gainesville, Florida for the holidays, said her family participates in United States holidays and Colombian traditions.
"On New Year's Eve we all get together and exchange a New Year's gift and tell our New Year's resolutions," Abdel-Khalik said. "New Year's is a tradition that comes from my mom's side of the family. She's from Columbia and New Year's Eve is actually more important to her than Christmas."
Christmas is the other holiday her family participates during that time.
"I get to put up the Christmas tree when I get home, partly because I am the oldest and partly because my mother doesn't know how to decorate and put a tree up," she said.
The administrative manager for the North Campus Entree Office, David Wahr, said that he hopes to start a new tradition this New Year's.
"I'm hoping that I will be joining Michigan at the Rose Bowl," he said.
Architecture Prof. Mete Turan, who's from Turkey, said he's going to Pittsburgh during break to visit friends because he doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving. But Turan said he participates in some American holiday traditions because of his children.
"My kids are very excited about the holidays because they celebrate both Turkish holidays and American holidays," Turan said.
Like Turan, Mira Mitra celebrates some American holidays because of her children's excitement.
"We celebrate at Christmas time and give gifts," said Mitra, an administrative assistant in Academic Affairs. "We don't have family over here, so we party with friends.
"My son will be coming home for the holidays. He celebrates both American and Hindu holidays," she said.
Mitra added that the main holiday for her family occurs in October, which is the celebration of the Indian festival Diwali. She traveled to India last year for the event, which is known as the "Festival of Lights."
"Our celebrations are so different than here. It doesn't matter if you know someone or not," Mitra said. "We all go out on to the streets and celebrate together. Here you celebrate with only family, we celebrate with everyone."
Rackham graduate student Piyapol Nimmananuthron said he won't celebrate Thanksgiving, but many of people in his home country Thailand will.
"Thai people will celebrate everything because they like to have fun," Nimmananuthron said.
Some international students are stranded in Ann Arbor without the comforts of home.
"It upsets me that break doesn't fall during the Chinese New Year because I would like to go back home for it," said Sandra, an LSA student who did not want her last name used.
"The Chinese New Year is just like Thanksgiving. Families get together, and we have fireworks and food," Sandra said. The New Year is celebrated on Jan. 28, she said.
Sandra, who is from Hong Kong, added that many of the Chinese holidays, such as the celebration of mid-autumn, have already occurred.
"For this celebration people appreciate the fullness of the moon," Sandra said. "We light candles inside lanterns and go outside at night to appreciate the moon."
She explained that moon cake is a sweet lotus seed cake with a yoke inside.
Sandra plans to fly to visit her brother in Vancouver, Canada during Winter Break and spend the Chinese New Year with other Chinese students on campus. Sandra said she wished the break occurred during the holidays that were most important to her.
But she said she doesn't mind being in the dorms during the Thanksgiving holiday.
"Friends can get together, and you don't have the pressure of homework and school stuff," she said.
But Omena Ubogu, an Engineering junior from West Africa, said staying alone during the break makes him unhappy.
"I usually stay in the dorms during Thanksgiving break. It's really boring," Ubogu said. "It's like the worst thing on Earth because no one is around, just me and my TV set."
Ubogu said the only holiday she celebrates during this time is Christmas.
"I'm making plans to go to England for Christmas because I have some friends and family over there, but first I have to see if I can get tickets," she said.
Shay said she uses her computer to put herself in the holiday mood.
"I always decorate my dorm. I take pictures and graphics off the computer and past them up," Shay said.
Engineering senior Lynn Zwica said that she and her roommates like to decorate the house they live in.
"We have some Thanksgiving things up now, and we'll decorate for Christmas," Zwica said. "We don't really have room for a tree. We might get a wreath. I know we'll have something. I live with six girls, and moms tend to send decorations."
Student Services Representative Marilyn Fitzpatrick said she likes to go to departmental parties and to play Christmas music at the office.
"We work right up until Christmas Eve, but we have fun," Fitzpatrick said. "We play chorales."
Fitzpatrick said that she liked to play "A Charlie Brown Christmas" CD and the "Cow's Christmas," which includes tracks titled "Deck the Stalls" and "We Wish You a Dairy Christmas and a Happy Moo Year."
"Music is a big part of Christmas for me," Fitzpatrick said.
Holiday travel can be more of an adventure than people desire.
Irving said bad weather almost ruined his vacation once on his drive home to Lansing.
"My worst experience during holiday break was when I was driving home, and there was this huge snow storm," Irving said. "I did a 80 (miles per hour) on I-96."
Irving added that he was lucky that it was 3 a.m., and there wasn't much traffic on the road.
LSA junior Colin Zyskowski also recalled road problems complicating trips home over the years.
"My car has broken down three times. I cracked my engine block once, and another time I ran out of transmission fluid," Zyskowski said.
Zyskowski said that each time he had to have his parents help him out.
"I had to walk in the cold, to a pay phone and call my parents to call a tow truck," he said.
Shay, who doesn't own a car, relies on her parents to pick her up and take her home to Bloomfield Hills.
Shay's parents drove all the way back to Bloomfield Hills one time after Shay realized she had made a big mistake.
"We were all the way back here when I realized that I had left my keys at my house. We had to drive all the way back home to get them," she said.
Wahr and his grandmother had a bad time flying home after visiting family in Denver after Christmas one year.
"I was sick and my grandma had the flu during the flight. There was bad turbulence, and there were screaming children behind us," Wahr said. "It was like the classic bad trip experience."
Not all travel experiences turn into bad memories, though. Abdel-Khalik had an unexpected surprise during a layover when she was traveling to home to Florida.
"I was going home at exactly the same time as some friends from other universities," Abdel-Khalik said. "We all met in the Atlanta terminal by accident."
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| LOUIS BROWN/Daily Rackham graduate student Piyapol Nimmananuthron, who's from Thailand, sits next to a Buddhist statue. He said he will not celebrate the upcoming holidays. |
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