The Predicament
As a college dormer, I've gotten used to having a love-hate relationship with food. In fact, food is what helps me get through the day. The question, "What should I eat?" brings me a lot of joy amidst my student life misery. But every day, this joy slowly becomes infested with the stress of calculating the time to walk to the dining hall, order food, wait, scarf down the food, and sprint back to campus to get to my next class, all because I don't want to waste my meal swipes. During that time, I lose 5 precious minutes that could've been used to walk back and I end up using real money to buy overpriced on-campus food or just starve until my last class of the day. It's a struggle that I think many of my peers can relate to.
There are three major ways that college dormers manage their study and eating schedules. The first is to simply deal with it and eat overpriced on-campus food with a guilty conscience (me). The second is to quite literally plan out your schedule to match the dining schedules just to study and eat without having to pay more. But, if you're like my roommate, the third and final option is to spend a little more money and time to fill up the mini-fridge that takes up half of your dorm. Thinking about this option, I began to wonder what people have in their cool boxes that makes it worthwhile for them to have a fridge take up all that space. So, I decided to investigate.
Investigation
Going into this investigation, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. There were so many variables like student class years, majors, dorm buildings, etc. But, with the help of two of our photographers, I decided that this investigation would be based on the infamous feud between UCLA's North Campus (N) and South Campus (S). For those of you who are not aware of this division, UCLA's campus is physically but ambiguously divided into two parts. North Campus includes Bachelor of Arts students and South Campus includes the students in STEM (Applied Sciences, Technology, Engineering, and Math). Below, you will be able to see five fridge profiles: NNN, NNS, NS, NSS, SSS.
NOTE: These profiles are anonymous because of unwarranted possession of fridge contents and the fridges itself. Also, this article is not meant to generalize a certain group and how they eat but is purely for entertainment and to show what some of the dormers choose to have in their mini-fridges.
NNN (Three North Campus Students)
Majors: Architectural Studies B.A., Psychology B.A., Human Biology and Society B.A.
Contents: vodka, ice, frozen fruits, water filter, aloe vera gel, chocolates, grapes, grapefruits, an apple, avocados, soy milk, and almond milk.
NNS (Two North Campus Students, One South Campus Student)
Majors: Business Economics B.A., Business Economics B.A., Mathematics/Economics B.S.
Contents: spritzer, beer, oranges, soda, Gatorade, sparkling juice, cheese, salsa, apples, and a banana.
NS (One North Campus Student, One South Campus Student)
Majors: Theater/Playwriting B.A., Neuroscience B.S.
Contents: cherry tomatoes, a vegetable platter, hummus, raspberries, mayonnaise, tortillas, juice, tea, bottled water, jam, butter, coffee, cheese, popsicles, ice, and frozen food.
NSS (One North Campus Student, Two South Campus Students)
Majors: Economics B.A., Nursing B.S., Human Biology and Society B.S.
Contents: kiwis, yogurt, tangerines, Korean soy milk, bottled water, and tea
SSS (Three South Campus Students)
Major: Biological Sciences B.S., Physiological Sciences B.S., Statistics B.S. and Business Economics B.A.
Contents: baking soda, limes, cream cheese, ham, cheese, and almond milk.
Afterthought(s)
I can't emphasize this enough: it was painfully difficult to find a group of all North Campus dormers in one room with a fridge. The dorms are seriously a hotspot for South Campus majors or those who have yet to realize that they actually belong in North Campus. In the end, based on only these rooms, it seemed like the room with one North and one South campus major, (NS) room was the most well-balanced in terms of quality, quantity, and variety.