'Too expensive to go home': Some NC State students stay on campus for Thanksgiving

RALEIGH, N.C. (WTVD) -- Some students at NC State remained on campus Thursday to do Thanksgiving because it was too expensive and too far to go home.

"We can't do a lot of things because the fields are closed, the library is closed so yeah just have friends here and that's all we can do," said Victor Dekeukelaere, an exchange student from outside France here for the semester.

Victor said it was far too expensive to go home. He and his friends looked at going to Charlotte for a Hornets game but that got too costly and too complicated.

"This is our first real Thanksgiving in America so we just try and buy some turkey and things to cook together," he said.

Though the fields and libraries weren't home, Victor and the students who did remain had free rein of the campus.

"This is new for us and everyone," said Ameya Jamkihndikar, a freshman from India. "So it's lonely sometimes but it's fun. The people who are here you can have fun with and you can be like a family."

It would take Ameya two days just to get home so he's working on his ping-pong skills.

"It's awesome -- the feeling of studying plus being in an actual college is really awesome," he said.

Students come back Monday for the last week of the fall semester then final exams.