Yom Kippur is simultaneously the best and worst holiday. It feels like the worst holiday when you're fasting all day long, but becomes the best holiday when you're stuffing your face with a schmear of food during break fast. This year's Yom Kippur happened to fall on a Wednesday so it was not possible to go home to celebrate.
My solution was to gather a bunch of my friends for break fast and have my parents send us food for the celebration. Follow these steps to do it for yourself if you can't go home for the holiday (and your parents are super nice, like mine).
Ask your parents to send food.
My first step to celebrating the holiday was to ask my parents to send food. When I'm home, my extended family gets together to break fast so my parents were already feeling a little badly that I was missing out. They were more than happy to send me New York bagels so I felt more included.
Gather your friends.
Obviously my parents were not about to send me one bagel, so I needed to get some of my friends together to celebrate. Even though most of my friends do not fast, they were more than happy to get together for dinner. Since I'm kitchen-less, one of my friends hosted us all.
Check out what was sent.
When I got the email that my package of food had arrived I went to the mailroom as quickly as I could. My parents had pretty much everything covered. They sent bagels, cream cheese lox, baked salmon, whitefish salad, and a babka from my favorite bagel place, Zabars.
Supplement anything if need be.
Like I said, my parents pretty much had everything covered, but there were a couple of things missing. I swung by Trader Joe's after class to supplement the missing stuff: Challah, orange juice, apple cider, capers, tomatoes, and an onion.
Eat and no longer feel famished.
Finally everything is set up and there's nothing left to do except wait until sunset to feast. Oh... and make sure to call the parents to thank them for the best break fast.
Although it's nice to be able to go home for the holidays, it's not always possible. There's nothing wrong with a little improvising. This Yom Kippur I got the best of both worlds to celebrate with my friends and eat well courtesy of my parents.