People like to say that college is the best time of your life. Four years ago, as I lay in bed after the first day of NSO, listening to the quiet snores of my super awesome roommate while reliving the craziness of that first day in my head, I knew there was no way that Stanford wouldn’t end up being the best time of my life.
Last summer, I was browsing the incredible cheese section of Milk Pail Market, that wonderful little market, when I was interrupted by a man with a faint European accent. “Do you eat cheese?”
Two years ago, a friend and I made a documentary for a film class about multiracial students and their experiences at Stanford. One, who was half Chinese, mentioned in her interview how she had never felt attracted to the Asian-American community at Stanford, saying, “I feel like at times they do become very stereotyped, just to be very honest. They become about getting boba, or about eating Asian food, or about other things like that, which to me are cultural elements, but that’s not what it’s really about.”
I’ve run into these sort of exchanges many a time, when people who’ve vaguely heard of Stanford’s reputation assume that it’s an Ivy League school, and every time, I just sort of smile and nod along. Unless it was said by a friend who’s just left themselves open for a good ball-busting, I tend not to go out of my way to correct the mistake, since a) I’ve always thought correcting a minor mistake like that to be sort of douchey and b) given the Ivies’ reps, it’s not like it’s an insult to be lumped in with them.
Until this year, Admit Weekends always unsettled me. Don’t get me wrong, I always wanted the ProFros (Prospective Frosh) to like their Admit Weekend as much as I had so that they would choose the best school in the country, but there was something that always got to me, just a little.
Before this year, I wasn’t a huge fan of chips. I mean, they were good, but they weren’t something I went out of my way for, and I never had them around. When I moved into my house this year, I was able to ignore the bags of chips stocked in our open kitchen for a while. But as the year went on, the constant supply of chips kept tempting me, and I’d sneak a Barbecue Pop Chip here, a Hawaiian Maui Sweet Onion Chip there. Now, every time I go down to get a drink of water, I can’t help myself from taking one or two of those addictive Tapatío Fritos, maybe following up with a Nancy’s Pita Chip.
A couple of nights ago, I bounced into the kitchen to make a Bagel Bite when I walked in on a couple of friends crisping up Dino Nuggets in the panini press. As we waited for our Bagel Bite and Dino Nuggets to get hot and crispy, we started shooting the shit, and somehow the subject of nursery rhymes and other songs from childhood came up.
Mix all that good stuff together, add a mess of chopped basil and thyme and baby, you got a ratatouille goin’!