A Home Away From Home: My Experience Living on Residence
Gauri Arora: Mechanical Engineering, Level 2
I can confidently say that the best decision I made (obviously after accepting my offer from McMaster) was to fill out the residence application form on May 30th, 2019. I’m writing this almost exactly a year later with an unbelievable amount of incredible experiences and memories from my first year of university, a lot of which were made on residence.
As someone who was always lucky enough to have my mom make my food every day and had never spent more than 3 days away from my family, all I could think about was how on Earth was I supposed to live on my own? How do you “adult”?? Honestly, it takes some getting used to but having to do everything for myself for those few months taught me so much about independence. Once I got into the groove of things, I started feeling a sense of accomplishment every time I cooked a meal, did my laundry, or believe it or not, even cleaned my toilet. Living in residence really allowed me to have a small taste of what it’s like to live in the real world and helped me figure out how to do some of the “adulting” that everyone is always talking about. There are also so many resources to help you figure things out too like the Community Advisors that live in each residence building.
My advice: Take advantage of them! They’re always there to give you the support you need and have been great friends/mentors to my friends and I throughout our first year. Also, don’t worry too much about living on your own because if I can do it, trust me you can too.
Something that I found was very important to my friends and I was being able to really make our dorms our own. There are so many ways to add personal touches to your space and doing so really helped me feel at home, especially in the beginning. It was really comforting for me to have tons of pictures of my friends and family, little knickknacks that reminded me of home, as well as decor that helped me add my own style to it. Two of our friends, my roommate, and I even got some fish to keep in our suites which was really fun for us!
My advice: Personalize your room as much as you can! Even though we can’t put holes in the walls, there are so many ways to decorate that really help to make your dorm your home away from home.
The thought of living away from home, potentially with people you don’t know, can be really scary. What made the transition easier for me was the support system I had. One of the best parts about living in residence is how easy it became to make friends. Going into welcome-week, the only people I had with me were a few of my friends from high school, including my roommate. A couple of days into it, we happened to meet some groups of people in the common room of my residence building, and we have spent every day together since then. Within a week, we had created our own little family and formed connections that I know will last us a lifetime. Our same welcome-week crew celebrated FOCO, Halloween, all of our birthdays, had a Secret Santa party for Christmas, and everything in between. Having this group really helped all of us ease into this new life because we went through it all together. Being away from home, the newfound independence, midterms, finals, and all of the scary but exciting things that come with first-year, I never went through any of it alone. Coming into university, everyone is in the same boat, despite coming from different backgrounds, high schools, and even countries.
My advice: It’s important to put yourself out there and try to make new friends because odds are, everyone you talk to is hoping to do the same thing. I am forever grateful that my decision to live in residence led me to meet some of my best friends and I’m looking forward to creating even more memories with them as we complete our undergrads together.
Overall, first-year is a complete learning curve and I quickly realized it’s about figuring things out as you go. It’s a time when you go through a lot of personal growth and make tons of memories. Just take it in strides, enjoy the ride, and if you’re considering living on residence, my advice: do it!
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