Students share the spectrum of ways they will be spending their winter breaks

Winter break is just around the corner for Pitt students who are eager to relax in the comforts of their own home, bake holiday-themed treats and get past finals.

Tyler Neffield, sophomore architecture major, said he won’t be resting at home — he’ll be taking a seven-hour train ride from Greensburg to New York City as a week-long winter break trip.

“We’re gonna discover the small little stores and coffee shops, because we’ve already done all the sightseeing,” Neffield said. “We’re also gonna see ‘Back to the Future’ and ‘Hadestown’ on Broadway.”

New York is a popular hotspot for many Pitt students vacationing this break. Despite only going for a day, Abby Harwell, an undecided first-year student, will be enjoying the big city by gazing at Macy’s Christmas windows.

“It’s the biggest Macy’s in the country,” Harwell said.“It’s also my first time going alone with my friends.”

Harwell isn’t the only one traveling outside of Pennsylvania for winter break. Lauren Bortner, first-year psychology major, will be escaping frigid northern cities by soaking in the warmth of Miami.

“I hope it’s hot,” Bortner said. “It’s going to be a nice break from Pittsburgh winters. For my parents … they wanted to get us all together and have a break from everything.”

Others are looking forward to the long break to celebrate the holidays. Cameron Kaplan, first-year psychology major, will be cherishing family time during Hanukkah.

“I like seeing my family and celebrating that time because we don’t get to spend as much time together anymore as we live in different areas,” Kaplan said. “After we light the candles, we all hug each other, and it’s called the ‘Hanukkah hug.’”

Besides lighting the candles with family, Hanukkah is also about cooking classic Hanukkah foods for Kaplan, who calls latkes and kugel “staples of Hanukkah for Jewish families.”

“We make a kugel with a graham cracker crust on top and latkes,” Kaplan said. “Latkes are one of my favorite foods in general. They’re salty and savory and delicious.”

Another way some students are looking to destress over winter break is through baking. Lauren Colpetzer, first-year biology major, bakes “almost every single day” with her family during the holidays, influenced by her favorite baking show.

“We make meringues, we make cookies, we make log cakes,” Colpetzer said. “We also watch the Great British Baking Show every day, and that’s our inspiration. I love it because I feel like the difference between American baking shows is they don’t care about winning. They just want to have fun, and it’s so refreshing.”

Carter Law, a first-year finance major, is excited to see both his human and non-human family when he returns home for break.

“I’m gonna go home and take care of all of my pets. They’re farm animals, so pigs, goats and chickens,” Law said. 

Though the farm animals require a lot of maintenance, Law doesn’t mind doing this over his break because he has a natural love for animals, which is clear from the naming of his farm animals — from Penny to Coco.

“I brush them, clip their hooves and take them out to walk them around the yard. It’s an all-day job,” Law said. “They’re just like dogs in a very weird way, and people underestimate how intelligent and friendly they are.”

James Cerny, a first-year electrical engineering major, will be spending his break in an unordinary way — building and driving around a go-kart in the snow. Cerny’s go-kart project falls more in line with mechanical engineering than his major, electrical engineering, since it involves buying parts, grinding them down, putting them together and working with the braking system.

“It’s very difficult — especially because of all the difficulties you run into along the way — but the end goal drives you to keep going forward with it and getting it done,” Cerny said. “It goes about 70 miles an hour. The cops don’t like it, but they can’t catch me.”

Cerny will not only be building during winter break, but also “blowing up a house – safely and legally, ” he said. With the local fire department, Cerny practices victim extractions in an abandoned house that they set on fire. Cerny will go in and out of the house using the VEIS method to rescue the fake victims as the fire chief watches and reviews the process.

“With the Plum house explosion and another house explosion in Ohio … It’s a real thing that could happen,” Cerny said. “In case it happens around us, we have to be prepared for worst case scenarios.”

The weeks leading up to winter break mark the end of the fall semester — and with this comes final exams. Maura Brositz and Jason Gao, sophomore information science majors, are more concerned with finishing their academic term. 

“I’m looking forward to the break, and it’s always exciting to see my family and friends, but finals are definitely at the forefront of my mind,” Brositz said.

Gao agrees, expressing stronger feelings about the toil of finals.

“For calculus, I’m gonna just pray and hope I don’t fail,” Gao said. “Finals is gonna kill me first, and then after being killed, break will come and I can relax.”