1. Taking the stairs

Living in a 400+ person building with 2 slow elevators, it is an unwritten and implied rule that those on floors 2-4 take the stairs. Stairs should be used when one has to go up or down a few flights of stairs as well. As a resident of the fourth floor, sometimes, we get tired and take the elevator, but you risk getting shamed and berated.

2. There’s throw up EVERYWHERE

This may sound like an exaggeration but you would be surprised. Throw up on the stairwell, the floor, the shower stalls, the elevator, the bathroom, trash cans. Sure they clean it up, but you still remember it was there.

3. You have a favorite shower stall

Every bathroom has three shower stalls, and almost everyone has a favorite one. The water pressure is different. Maybe you like the last stall because you don’t like people staring at the silhouette of your naked body as they walk to their shower stall. Maybe you have bad memories in one of them. Regardless, you have a favorite shower stall and sometimes won’t shower until it is open.

4. You get no work done in the skylounge

Sure there are study rooms, but how much studying really gets done? So many people filter in and out of the skylounge, also deemed “sklounge”, that you are bound to see someone you know or get distracted by others talking. Building activities are led in the skylounge as well-meaning mid math homework, you could be interrupted by karaoke or trivia. Getting work done takes twice the time it would have in the skylounge.

5. The kitchens are disgusting

The best time to use the kitchens on the odd floors and skylounge is right at the beginning of the school year when little to nobody has used them. The building cleaners are not paid to clean the kitchens of swig or the pans and pots used to cook and lazy college students sure aren’t cleaning, resulting in nasty smelling kitchens with old dried up food everywhere. There will be pots full of 4 month old alfredo, bowls coated in pancake batter from two weeks ago, and the burners will smell like extreme burning when turned on due to food residue stuck all over them. Your best bet is to find the cleanest kitchen and use that one or the one in the skylounge which is rarely used and usually pretty tidy compared to otherwise r odd numbered floors.

6. You meet friends simply from living in a 400 person building

It is almost impossible not to make friends living in Swig and you will come to recognize many of the residents. Swig is the only residence hall at SCU where every floor is just one straight hallway. This design facilitates friendships in that when you open your door, there is a good chance, you will see someone down the hall. There is no separation of wings because all floors are one continuous hall, promoting community and an easy way to meet people.

7. There’s a reputation that comes with living in Swig

There is a reputation that comes with being a Swig resident. In introductions to others, when asked where do you live, you can see the judgement on some individuals’’ faces when you answer “Swig”. The building has a big reputation for loudness, partying, and trouble. Swig is a social hub for first year students but that does not mean that every resident is a party animal. You might get some snarky responses when people find out you live in Swig but it is probably because they wished they lived there.

8. Community fines you had nothing to do with

Living in Swig, people do stupid things. They smear foods on the walls, they draw pictures on the walls, overflow toilets, steal ceiling tiles, and destroy just about anything out in the open. Oftentimes, when these things go without a culprit and nobody comes forward, the cost becomes a community fine. These fines are split up among the residents on the damaged floor and can range in amount. Living on the fourth floor, we got threats of fines from the 420 sign being stolen as well as from food spilled in our stairwell. You may have had nothing to do with them, but you will end up paying for them, which is one giant downside to living in a building where people damage things for fun.

9. Quiet hours aren’t a thing

Yes, there are set quiet hours but nobody listens to them. Sound carries very easily throughout Swig halls and there will always be people awake all hours of the day. You might find yourself trying to sleep at 1am on a Tuesday and you are awoken by people talking outside your door and laying in the hallway. You could get mad but it is also the case that you are or will be that person at 1am sometime.

10. EMTs EMTs EMTs

People party in Swig. It is a known fact, but in college, students are testing their limits and oftentimes that can go very wrong. Due to this, you will see the EMTs quite often in Swig. The student-led EMT team will enter with their backpacks and airway bags and every once in a while, the ambulances will be called and people will be taken to the hospital. Lesson: don’t be stupid and take care of yourself.

11. Wake up Swig

“Wake up Swig” is a phrase you will hear too many times your first few weeks of school. During the first weeks of school when everyone is underestimating how much studying and work they actually need to do, people will go out and when passing Swig, yell in their loudest voices “Wake up Swig”. You can hear this anytime of the day including the early morning hours such as 1-4am. The light sleepers should be warned because this can often wake them up. As the year goes on, less and less people will yell at Swig but every once in a while you will hear a drunken “Wake up Swig” from time to time.

12. The temperature difference of Street Side and Campus Side

In Swig there are two sides, Street side and Campus side and there is a huge temperature difference between the two. Street side is often not the preferred side due to the fact that it does not have as nice of a view as Campus side and in addition, it is constantly being beat down on by the hot California sun and in Swig there is NO air conditioning. During the beginning of school and all of Spring quarter, the Street side room residents will be plugging in as many fans as possible because it feels like Satan became the third resident of their room. Campus side is more shaded and is usually a good 20 degrees cooler than Street side which is really only a downside in the winter time (but its a California winter so how bad really is it?). The Campus side rooms are likely pretty drafty and are tangibly cooler than Campus side overall.

13. Every floor has a different vibe

With there being 10 floors of Swig, each floor tends to develop its own personality over time and its own separate reputation based on the residents and happening on the floor. It is easily observable the different floor vibes just by being there for a little bit of time. Some floors will be known for being pretty dead and calm (like the first floor), some for a certain type of resident, some are known for community, partying, being stupid, and pretty much anything. If you get tired of your own floor, you can walk to another one and be in a completely different scene.

14. Nothing will surprise you anymore

It is a known fact that really weird stuff happens in Swig. I have had countless unfortunate events happen to me such as having my fridge peed on and my window thrown up on which is just a grosser side of the spectrum. After living in Swig, nothing that happens will surprise you. There was a time where a kid put an actual toilet in the elevator of Swig and sat on it while riding up and down, stopping on every floor. People will do heinous things that sometimes are random and make no sense but it gives you a lot of stories and the ability to deal with random problems.