Residence, the place where memories are made and you realize that maybe you don’t play nice with others. It’s a big part of freshman year and as with any life experience, there are the pros and cons. Many students look back fondly on their experiences, but are quick to remember why they would never live in residence again, ever. Here are some of the better things about living in Rez.
Always around friends/community/family
The people you live with in residence quickly become your second family. You don’t get to choose your rezmates, and there will be people you’ll love, and others who you aren’t as equally fond of. However, these are the friends that’ll be there when you ace that final exam, or blow a midterm. They’ll watch the game with you, and be the first to split a cab with you. Maybe they won’t be your closest friends at school, but when you need an HDMI cord or just someone to talk to, your residence community will be there for you. When you need someone to rant or cry to, you neighbour is there like State Farm.
Super Close to Classes
The luxuries of residence include waking up 15 minutes before class and still making it on time. UOttawa is not a particularly large campus and one can easily book it across campus in 8 minutes, even in boot heels! Once you move off campus, those precious extra 20 minutes of sleep will no longer be yours, so enjoy them in residence while you can!
Easy to Meet People
Knocking on everyone’s door first week is an easy way to meet everyone in residence and during the first week, things like that really aren’t weird. When you’re focusing in class it can be hard to chat up the person sitting next to you, and talking to the person behind you in the Timmie’s line is way more intimidating than it looks. Residence answers the question, “How in the heck am I supposed to meet people?!” You are guaranteed to see the same people in the halls over and over and over again and science (okay, not real science) states that a conversation will happen one time or another.
C’mon guys, making new friends is fun!
Something to Do
Planned activities are one serious perk of residence. Sure, sometimes they’ll be kind of lame but when you have a group of friends to go with, it doesn’t matter what you’re doing! You’ll be grateful for them when you and your buds are sitting twiddling your thumbs and counting ceiling tiles, which unfortunately does happen. Your CAs just want you to have a fun time in Rez!
Your Roommate
This can go one of three ways. You can have the good roommate, the bad roommate or the invisible roommate. For now, we’re focusing on the good roommate. During the first couple of weeks, getting to know a stranger’s habits can be difficult and downright confusing. You also can’t judge your roommate on first impressions because most people are rather reserved and awkwardly polite for the first little while. However once that phase passes, your true roommate comes out and sometimes it can be a complete blessing, like my roomie. They’ll be the first person you tell about your day and the listening ear for those late night talks. They’ll get to know you for who you really are, messy bedroom and all, and if you’re lucky they’ll still appreciate having you around. It’s amazing to have a friend 2 feet away at most times.
Then there are the not so good things…
Loud neighbours or floormates
If you are a light sleeper, then I definitely suggest buying a pair of earplugs. Partying nights are no longer limited to Fridays and Saturdays and your floormates in rez will take full advantage of any night they can party. It can be incredibly frustrating when you are studying for a test on a Tuesday night and your neighbours are partying loudly and rapping along to their blaring music to celebrate finishing THEIR midterms. There will be nights when you wish your residence could just take it down a notch and you debate duct taping your pillow around your ears.
Lack of General Cleanliness or Hygiene
There was a slice of pizza that sat in our residence stairwell for over a week. A group of lovely young academics decided to urinate down the garbage shoot and all over the garbage room in my residence. The floors of residence are generally covered in sticky beer stains or a rather unpleasant smelling cleaner. You live with hundreds of eighteen year olds experiencing freedom for the first time. I don’t think there’s much more I need to say to convince you that residence isn’t a place for the ‘five second rule’.
Rules, Rules, Rules
It’s one thing to have your parents tell you off at home, but getting fined is a totally different experience. In residence there are your CAs (Dons or RAs at some universities) who will always be around to monitor the general state of the floor and make sure nothing too crazy happens. Then there is security and they have no qualms about sending all your friends away, taking your alcohol and fining you. It happens. Mostly they just disperse the party but during exams some fines can be given out for excessive noise. It can also be a pain to sign guests into residence on the weekend because the line is huge. Yes, there is a certain amount of freedom, but there are still many rules and regulations in place to keep you under control.
There is No Escaping
When you live on campus, there is no escaping the university. You will never get away from election posters, demonstrations on campus or gloomy architecture. There won’t be any true alone time in residence and if you are down about school, it’s very difficult to get out of that funk. If you don’t consciously make an effort to get off campus every once in a while your mood will turn sour quickly.
You also can’t really escape the company of others. It can be hard to get work done when people are knocking on your door asking you to come out tonight, or when a group of people are watching that movie you really like in the common room. Sometimes you just want to run into the wilderness and hide. Seriously.
Your Roommate
Sometimes you draw the short straw in life and one of those short straws is a bad roommate. It could be something as simple as they don’t ever clean up their mess in the kitchen, or they could have people over all the time. Maybe they blast that specific type of music that you hate or sometimes, you two just don’t mesh well. It happens and this can put a serious damper on your residence experience. It’s hard to want to go home when you don’t want to see your roomie, or put up with their nonsense because you’re too nervous to start a fight. Just push through, it’s only eight months of your life you’ll never get back.
Breathe it out.