Even after graduating from Williston and heading in different directions; a group of the Class of 2019 reunited in Boston from colleges all across America to celebrate “Friendsgiving.”

The eleven students included Simon Kim, Vishnu Sekar, Insoo Kang, Nhi Nguyen, Hoang Dang, Nithish Raja, Punn Phentrakul, Emily Cho, Rio Oshima, Khomei Kadoya, and Artur Lysuk.

Insoo, Artur, Nhi, Minh and Rio attend school in the Boston area and they have been meeting regularly in the city, which has eased the process of organizing a larger event amongst their friend group.

Insoo, attending Boston University, contributed to organizing the get together through group chat communication.

“It’s really easy how we organized our meeting because all our colleges are so close to each other,” he said. “We have a group chat for the people in Boston and meet every one or two weeks, but for the big event, we had a group chat of 12 people and we discussed what food we wanted, the location of the house, and a date convenient for everyone.”

Simon Kim, from South Korea, attending Stanford University in California, flew east for the reunion.

“It was really nice seeing my friends, because being on a completely different coast, I don’t get to see them a lot.” said Simon.

Vishnu Sekar from Saudi Arabia, currently attending Drexel University in Pennsylvania, agreed.

“It was great to reconnect with friends as most of us all go to different places now and we were eager to see how everyone was doing” said Vishnu.

“We met up at an Airbnb and played a bunch of card games,” said Vishnu of the actual thanksgiving reunion. “There were eleven of us, so we sat down and shared stories.”

Thanksgiving is a time when many families gather together to eat and take the opportunity to express gratitude to each other. Since everyone in the group was an international student, and a five-day break was too short to fly back home, they celebrated thanksgiving amongst themselves and expressed gratitude to one another for being in their lives even after their time at Williston..

“After graduation we told each other we would meet up sometime when we’re in college and this was a good opportunity, as most of our friend group didn’t go anywhere during this break, said Vishnu. He continued, “We ordered thanksgiving food like stuffing, turkey and salad and other things and [we] also [ordered] from a Thai Place.”

During their five-day break in Boston, they spent time playing games and talking about their new chapter in life.

“It’s just really fun to talk about our new lives at different schools and reminisce over some good time we had at Williston” said Insoo.

Simon brought up a beloved character from the TV show The Office. “There were a lot of references to the Andy Bernard quote: ‘I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them.'”

Those “good old days” for the the freshman included eating Bagels from Tandem. Simon said, “Something common that we all miss is defintely Tandem, as it is really hard to get bagels as good as Tandem around here.”

The campus and tight knit community offered at Williston is a huge contrast to colleges located smack in the heart of a larger city like Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, or Washington D.C.

Insoo told The Willistonian, “We miss the suburban and small community that Williston offered at time when we’re at huge, metropolitan colleges.”

Nhi Nguyen, Managing Editor of The Willistonian last year, is also attending Boston University.

Before the event, Nhi was worried about whether everyone would feel awkward around each other given that they hadn’t met since graduation. However, her concerns were proven wrong. “It was like we never left!”

“We talked and laughed non-stop while sharing our weird and crazy moments of college,” Nhi said. “There was no awkwardness at all and definitely there was a lot of nostalgia happening during the night. We always started our sentences with ‘Remember that time when?'”

Punn Phentrakul attends The George Washington University in Washington D.C. She feels that college has opened her eyes to the “real world,” but that life at Williston also gave them a leg up in adjusting to life after high school.

“I feel like we were more exposed to the real world and that somehow did make us more mature” said Punn. “However, the way we treated each other and cared for each other remained the same.”

At Williston, the tight-knit community stresses the importance of staying connected through thick and thin, even after the graduation tent comes down and people walk different roads.

“We mentioned that we are grateful that Williston had brought us together and we’ve remained friends even after high school,” expressed Punn.

Thanksgiving break rejuvenated Punn with good energy to persevere through exams before heading back to Thailand for holiday break

“Being with friends from Williston gave me the positive energy I needed after an exhausting time in college,” Punn said. “I feel recovered and ready to power through my finals.”

Maddy Scott ’16, Assistant Director of Alumni Engagement & Giving at Williston, works with fifteen youngest alumni classes to plan events.

Maddy was impressed by the recent grads’ success in planning this event, especially with such a large number of attendees.

Maddy told The Willistonian, “I was super excited because that is what everyone in this office wants is for alumni to stay connected and for them to take the initiative. I think that is fantastic.”

The Alumni office strives to host numerous networking events throughout the year, all in the goal of staying closely connected to the school.

“Tomorrow [December 11], there is a Boston Holiday Party at the Union Club and next week there is a Holiday Party at the Yacht Club in New York City. In January there will be the young alumni assembly panel and in March there will be Florida, Washington, and Philadelphia,” explained Maddy.

As an alum herself, Maddy is passionate about her job in strengthening the Williston network.

“I hear time after time that Williston has changed their lives even more so than the college experience,  and that helps in term of mission driving cause it makes me feel like this is why I do what I do,” said Maddy.

The connections one develops throughout their Williston journey are vital, since people come from every corner of the world and their interests lay in a wide variety of fields; the connections can act as a mechanism of helping one another in the future.

“The power of your Williston network can sometimes be more powerful than any other network you will have, because it is such a small community with a diverse student body and you never know what you will need from your network” explained Maddy.

The Boston reunion group hopes to organize future gatherings during upcoming shorter breaks when they can’t fly home.

“We will somehow find a way to get together again!” said Nhi. “The next time might be on the west coast, since Simon is so desperately demanding it.”