Roommates 101

It’d be nice if everyone got along.

But then again, we wouldn’t need playground supervisors then, or martial arts, or zombie survival books. The reality is that conflict, when it comes to your living situations, is to some degree, inevitable. Whether it be “All right everyone. This is not funny. Where are my Digimon Fruit Snacks.” or an unruly overnight visitor, I’ve compiled a list of basic ideas and things to keep in mind during your “rooming” experience this upcoming year. Gathered from numerous suggestions, friendly testimonies, and some of my own personal experiences, I hope that you use this blog post to your advantage to really navigate through the possible minefields that may come your way.

Now, I will explain these tips to you through numbers in a well-organized number format. Cool.

1) Set guidelines and a living contract

Yes. I know. Rules are no fun. But in this case, I find rules to be STRONGLY recommended, if not NEEDED to set a common understanding and respect of everyone’s wants. To successfully achieve this activity, I need you to be honest with yourselves. (This is deep folks.) Know your living habits, and introduce them in a positive light to your roommates the first day. (For example, if you sleep late at night, you can express that you think of yourself as a nocturnal person, and you like working in the night because of the peace) That way, you can establish base expectations of your living mates, rather than unfortunate (or fortunate?) surprises later. To get you started, go over acceptable noise levels at times of day, Food Sharing Policies, Visitor Policies amongst your suite, Cleaning Routines, and all that good ol’ nice stuff.

2) Keep in mind of future arrangements
By this, I mean to be aware of compromises made in the beginning too hastily; for example, when you all are starting to make rooming arrangements, you may decide as a residence hall suite/and or apartment to purchase a TV, microwave, or any sort of handy item. Just be careful. Think about how such an item would be divided by the end of the year, and this will eventually be a potential problem if not addressed. No one’s happy slicing their TV into portions. So, when you establish “sharing” rules for any sort of item, try to find a compromise, such as “I’ll bring my plasma TV from home if you can bring your high-tech Microwave,” Many conflicts can be avoided by simply thinking ahead.

3) Socialize with each other
I know this sounds ridiculous. "Socialize? I’ll be around my suite-mates and/or apartment-mates for HOURS, how could I not socialize with them?" While of course, you will spend your sleeping hours together to some extent, I, along with many, found that it is easy to let a rift happen between your suitemates/and or apartment mates after time. Different social circles will cater to your different experiences and personalities, and with your classes and/or extra-curriculars, it will be easy to stray, so plan for simple things, such as dinner together on a Thursday night. Yeah, I know, it sounds corny and sentimental, but it goes a long way in becoming not only more easygoing around each other early on, but also reaching friendly compromises and peaceful conclusions to arguments.

But if not?(This brings us to our next point)

4) Sometimes, you just “gotta", seek outside guidance.

Outside help can come in a variety of ways: while your RA and your Res. Life are great resources (in facilitating conflicts), if and when a major trouble occurs (that seems unsolvable), it may be also beneficial to you to share your experiences with a good friend . By doing so, you might be able to see the conflict from a third perspective to look at how you can tackle your “trouble” in a new way. Sometimes, when everything seems to hit the fan along with housing troubles, the knowledge that you have a support of a few good people to talk to (friends and staff) support of a few good people is all you need to go through a rough time.(Don’t roll your eyes here, these are true words)

5) R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

Those good 7 letters combine to make an even better word; respect for your living mates’ items and privacy goes far in establishing not only trust and good relationships, but also an all-around good year with your living partners. I hear it also builds character.

So really, it’s important to keep all these things in mind. All this scratches the surface, but I hope you all have all gained at least that “something” from this blog post.

And in all, in the worst case scenario, if you find that your apartment-mates/suitemates are not simply compatible, if you have these and some of your own base guidelines established, you will always have these set to fall back on to coexist and be on the same wavelength.

But in all optimism as well, having the lucky opportunity to have a roommate(s) as a confidant and a good friend is invaluable in your college career and your latter life. It’s all about give and take, to find that balance between friendship, rooming relations and everything in between.

I’ll also leave you with something else: Touching on what most people said, it’s important to keep things in balance. Academically balanced, socially balanced, physically balanced, and balancing your friendships not only in your living space but also around you. Once things start slipping in the wrong direction, it falls on you to you to change your path the way YOU want it to.

Oh, and if you didn’t know, Warren’s kind of big on establishing a balance in life. Which is kind of why you’re entering a great college.

Last thing: CONGRATULATIONS in getting into UCSD. You’re going to enjoy University.

-Brian Lee
Freshman Orientation Leader GROUP 18!

It's time for a ...

RES HALL AND APARTMENT TOUR!!!

I know as an incoming freshman, one of the things I was most excited about, was moving into my own place! During the months leading up to that coveted day in September, I was constantly on the look out for stuff that I would want for my dorm. By the end of August I had bought so much stuff, that I began to wonder where it would all go! When I finally got to UCSD, and the people helping me move in (YES, YOU HAVE PEOPLE TO HELP YOU MOVE IN! :) ) looked at the trunk of my car with wide open mouths. Haha. Pathetic, yes.

Well anyways, I’ll be giving you a tour of both the Res-Halls and the Apartments, so you’ll be able to see where you’ll be living next year!

I’m Lauren and I’ll be your tour guide today J

Residential Halls

Let’s start with the Residential Halls. Welcome to Harlan (Go Harlan!!), Frankfurter, and Stewart. Inside of the Residential halls, are suites. Inside each suite, there are 6 rooms-4 singles and 2 triples (or doubles if you’re lucky). Each has a desk(s), bed(s) (Twin XL), trash can, chair, closet, and a set of drawers. In each building there are 2-5 suites per floor, and the RAs live on every floor except for the top floor of each building. The suites are single sex, but the floor is co-ed. This is the door to the suite… let’s go in!

Once inside, the first room you’ll encounter is one of the triples.

This is a triple room. Inside, there’s a loft bed, a bunk bed, three desks, three chairs, two closets,and a large wardrobe for the person in the loft bed. There are also ladders to help you climb onto the top bunk. (No, we don't expect you to be monkeys) Inside each of the closets, are a set of drawers. The closets and the drawers were nice and large enough to fit my wardrobe (and that's saying a lot). Unfortunately there aren’t drawers for the lofted bed, but inside of the wardrobe, there are drawers to use. The triple room is fairly large, and there's enough room for a refrigerator or a microwave if you want to bring one.

Onto a single room! The single room is set up with a bed, a desk, a set of drawers, a chair, a trashcan, and a closet. The closet is the same size as the closet from the triple room. Under the bed is also a storage bin. The area under the bed was even large enough for me to lay under the bed. : ) If you were wondering about bringing a fridge/microwave, they fit in the single room. You can rearrange your furniture to suit your needs as well.

Onwards toward the bathroom! The bathroom has two shower stalls, two bath room stalls, three sinks, and 9 cubbies for holding all your bathroom stuff! The bathrooms are nice, with INSTANT hot water, and high powered toilets. YES!

Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of the common room, but there are two couches, a coffee table, a side table, and a table fit for a TV. Also you get a super nice balcony.

On the really nice days, the balcony was a perfect place to sit out and read, or just talk to your suitemates. Every day, maintenance comes through the suites, and takes out the trash in the common room, and then vacuums, and cleans the bathroom, which is REALLY nice. They won't clean your rooms though, that's for you to do. But beware, if you let your suite become too messy, they will refuse to come in, and then you're in trouble. Be sure to befriend your maintenance person, as you'll be seeing them everyday.

Okay... that's basically it for the residential halls. Onward to the Apartments!

Apartments

The apartment buildings consist of Douglas, Goldberg, Black, and Brennan halls. The apartments all contain two rooms, each having either two doubles or a double and a triple, a bathroom, a shower, lots and lots of cabinet space, a kitchen, a living room, and a dining area. The rooms all have the same amenities as the residence hall rooms.

This is what a double room looks like. There are two different layouts to the room, depending on where the closet is located. Both have the same square footage, just the positioning of the beds is different.

Unlike the residential halls, the bathroom and the shower are in two separate rooms. This is convenient especially since someone taking a shower wouldn't tie up the whole bathroom. There are two sinks, one for each room.

I think my FAVORITE part about the apartments was the KITCHEN! I loved cooking everyday, and with Earl's Place right around the corner, I had the ability to conjure up anything my heart desired. :) The living room was right next to the kitchen, and the living room had 2 couches, and a coffee table. It's definitely a nice place to stay :)

And that concludes your tour of the housing options available to you! Hopefully this gives you a better idea of where you'll be living come fall. :)

Get STOKED for college, it's gonna be flipping amazing :D

-Lauren Tomosada

Group 10