Extended Holiday: Maximize Holiday to Make you More Productive!

“An extended holiday is a weekend that is at least three days long (so, a three-day weekend), due to a public holiday falling on either the Friday or Monday. Most countries also feature many four-day weekends, in which two days adjoining the weekend are holidays. “

Stomach is rumbling, our mouth is drying, tired of working all day, the sun began to set as the sky turns fiery orange. All people can't wait no more for that astounding sound. “Allahu akbar Allahu akbar...” Finally, the long awaited Adzan Magrib sounded. All the Moslems can eat and drink now. Moslems can break their fast and enjoy food and drink as much as they want after almost holding yourself to 12 hours of no eating.

Working seems like no cool anymore though. All we can think is there will be long public holiday to enjoy in the Lebaran days. Lebaran is identical with long holiday. Not only Moslems, all people in Indonesia are going to have this 7ish day off from work. There are lots of things that can be enjoyed in this free time. 

However, this extended holiday must be maximized like no other holiday. This is a holiday that you have to spend well. You can’t miss this holiday by not preparing from the start. You have worked for around 11 months after this extended ‘Lebaran Holiday’ happened last year. We are of course tired of always sitting 9 hours every day doing work. So, just give yourself a treat! 

Maximizing your holiday will give you a significant impact on your productivity at work. After Lebaran days, of course we will go back to work, like our daily routines. But, I assume greatly you don't want to be unmotivated to get back to work caused by the lame holiday you don't enjoy.

In fact, according to www.businesstravelnews.com, travelling and spending time with great plans for a holiday can increase your motivation and productivity at work. There are lots of advantages if you maximize this holiday time, right?

So, this year, what can we do in this extended holiday? With the glorious 7 days holiday that only happens once a year, what can we do to maximize the extended holidays?  Here are some tips that you can follow.

1. Check the date first!

• Check when the holiday is, how long the holiday is, and in which days the holiday are. Plan your holiday based on the calendar. This will help in making your holiday better. This will affect how much time will we spend in our holiday, how much our time to rest, how much money will we spend, even which destination will we go to. Do check if in this public holiday there’s a hari kejepit! Use that hari kejepit maybe to take your day-off from work.

2. Find your interest. Ask these questions to yourself:

• What kind of holiday do you like to enjoy?
• Do you enjoy holidays alone or with lots of people around you?
• Do you enjoy going to city tours, nature tours?

3. After finding your interest then pick a destination!

• My recommendation for city tour: Malang and Jogja
• My recommendation for nature sceneries kind of tour: Kepulauan Seribu and Karimun Jawa beaches. Merbabu and Semeru for mountains.

Museum Angkut: One of the recommended destination when you are on a city tour in Malang

Mount Merbabu: a breath-taking view that makes you feel so small in this big, big, world

4. Plan your holiday well.

• Not only what you are going to do in the holiday, but plan your expense as well
• Plan where to go, in which days, with what accommodation, where you live and how much will it cost. You can write those down on a little notebook that you can bring around when you are in your holiday. 

5. Don’t forget to spend some time to rest.

• Holiday is in fact tiring, so before entering work-hell again, spare your time to rest yourself. It can take 1 day or 2 days maximum. You can just stay at home, watching tv, massaging or even hibernating all day. Get your body fit again before entering work.

6. Enjoy the holiday!

• Mindset is everything. Mindset can decide which holiday you will face: an enjoyable one or a not so holiday one. So if something outside your plan happened, just enjoy your time! Remember, this long 7ish day-off raaaarely happens. 

So, those are the tips that you can follow to make your holiday better. After enjoying those fun times in your vacation, I hope that you can get back to work fresher and more productive. I hope that you are not attached too much with the holiday nuance.

I hope that you can accept that in real life, you live in a city which is really crowded, traffic jams everywhere, and stressful days. If you are still unmotivated though, you can try to make up your mindset slowly before getting to serious working, eating healthy food, spare your time to do sports, and always think positively.

Holiday won't help you to get motivation if you do not enjoy your work at first. Make friends, do good, and sometimes you can make your work as your escape as well. 

So, good luck trying holiday to escape! And don’t forget, being stressed is okay, but don’t be too long, it won't help you at all. Find ways to be awesome instead!

References:
http://www.businesstravelnews.com/Business-Travel-Research/The-Frequent-Traveler-Fitter-Happier-More-Productive
https://www.jobstreet.co.id/career-resources/5-tips-kembalikan-semangat-kerja-setelah-libur-panjang-2/#.WywmiaczbIU

Picture References: 

https://www.yukepo.com/hiburan/horror/selain-menarik-dan-bersejarah-museum-angkut-di-malang-ini-juga-punya-kisah-berhantu/