After living in my apartment for a week, I now understand why there is a requirement for all of the students to live on campus for two years at Ohio State. While I've been looking forward to living in an apartment since I moved on campus, I'm glad that I hadn't been given the opportunity to move off campus before now. Even though my roommates and I get along great, there have been some struggles that we've faced since moving in.
1. The WiFi
I have never had to set up WiFi before. This wasn't something that I had thought about before arriving at the apartment. We had all sorts of problems; it took four days and two technicians. This made me miss the easily accessible campus WiFi that you just logged in to and didn't have to troubleshoot.
2. Cooking
Even though I knew how to cook basic foods, having to cook for three people and combine three different food tastes has been more difficult than I imagined. There have been some foods that we've attempted to make that just haven't worked out in our apartment. One of the first days, one of my roommates tried to make chili for the first time, and it ended up being more meat than soup.
3. Buying groceries
The first time we went shopping, there were so many things that we needed to buy. I feel like every time I try and cook something, I realize that I am missing an ingredient or two in order to cook it. I feel like I've gone to the grocery store so many times since moving in, and I don't know how much longer this is going to continue.
4. Paying utilities and rent
When you pay for room and board, you pay once and the beginning of the year. But now I have to actually worry about paying rent on time and that I'm not doing things that will cause me to have to pay more in utilities.
5. Meeting the neighbors
I live in an apartment complex, and I know that I have neighbors, but I haven't really seen them much. When you live in a dorm with a communal bathroom, you eventually have to run into all of the people that live near you. However, this year the reason that we've talked to the neighbors has been about parking issues.
6. Sharing a bathroom
While I'm super close with my roommates, having only one bathroom means we have to share. There are some weird things about our bathroom, like the fact that we have two vanities. So two people can get ready in the morning, but there are only one shower and one toilet. We've had to figure out each others' schedules and how to best share the space.
7. Combining different living styles
When you grow up, the things that your parents teach you are what you tend to believe as the best way to do things. Organizing the kitchen has been the most part. There are many different ways you can do things there, and each one of us has a different way. One question that I didn't anticipate having to answer when I moved in was where I stored my bread, but it was a discussion that we had on the first day.
8. Commute time
Even though I only live a couple of blocks away from campus, I still live further away than I did last year. I'm still not really sure exactly how long it takes me to get to my classes from my house, so I'm arriving at a lot of them a lot earlier than I need to.
9. The condition of the apartment
Since it's a college town apartment, the apartment is never going to be exactly perfect. There are some outlets that don't work, and there's no rhyme or reason to it. The second day we were in the apartment, it rained and far too much water came into the kitchen through the window. It's something that I didn't expect to have to deal with in the first couple of days of being back.
