I’ve discovered one thing in my travels that I never expected: celebrating American-only holidays abroad is fun, like I always thought, but can illicit much more homesickness than previously experienced (why was this a surprise for me? who knows).
During our (by “our” I mean me & my cousin Courtney) tour of Southeast Asia, we had two Thanksgivings: a lonely one with the Angkor ruins in Cambodia, and a Friendsgiving on the roof of our hostel in Chiang Mai, Thailand.
These two celebrations encapsulate traveling for me: overcoming homesickness with the reminder of the beauty surrounding us, and celebrating something in common with new friends. In addition, these two celebrations were good reminders for me to be thankful: thankful for the ability to follow my dreams and travel, and thankful that I have loved ones back where I came from, too.
Our Friendsgiving in Chiang Mai started on the first day of the Loi Krathong festival (more on this later). We spread a blanket on the roof of our hostel, the Green Tulip–the best hostel in Thailand, I’m sure of this fact–and filled it with quite an array of dishes. Superb salad, chips and salsa, Subway sandwiches, falafel, burritos and Coca-Cola. All of the American things we’d yet to find in Thailand. Despite the fact that our attempts to make Thanksgiving ambience caused a small fire (our blanket was not the best tablecloth for tiny tea lights) it was the perfect Thanksgiving abroad, especially as the roof was the perfect starting off point to enjoy the lanterns in the sky for the festival.
The real date of Thanksgiving was full of Skyping family, eating ice cream, nursing our travel illnesses and feeling homesick. It was the first time it had been just the two of us without friends to guide us, and it was lonely. It was hard to Skype with our families and see my parents and especially our little dog, searching around at the sound of my voice, confused that I didn’t seem to be there in person. The next morning, though, we watched the sunrise over Angkor Wat, and I remembered why I was on this journey.
Traveling isn’t always the easiest path. You don’t always get to be with all of your loved ones on the holidays, and you’ll miss them.
That doesn’t mean there aren’t beautiful things to see and new loved ones to meet.
{Photos: the view from our roof / Thanksgiving spread before the fire / our co-celebrators / Angkor Wat ruins at sunrise}
p.s. excuse my hair. While I would blame the humidity, the heat, traveling, lack of a decent shower, and all of that is true, my hair kind of always looks unruly.
