Frisky Scribbles: Bower House, 2009-2010

Many people ask me... Why co-op? Why Bower? Till last year this was my standard answer, "I am lazy and I depend heavily on Google, so when it came to choosing a housing establishment in East Lansing, where I was going to pursue my Masters, all I did was typed www.google.co.in and queried 'student housing in MSU'. Up popped a few links and I followed the first one to a cool looking web-form, with a few fun questions, what are your hobbies, do you like living with fun-loving people, do you listen music at high volumes or do you like co-existing with fellow beings in peace and harmony... I filled it up for fun and in few days I receive a mail asking me if I would be okay with living with 20 fun-loving people in the Vlach-Bower house, on the 127, Whitehills Dr. Sure I replied back.
Seriously, little did I know what I was getting into."

The story goes something like this...
I touched base in US on 7th August, 2009. Got stranded at Cincinnati Airport, thanks to the air traffic in New York but was lucky, enough to secure the last seat on the last flight of Delta Airlines just 5 mins before its departure.
As I sat next to a cowboy (yeah, he was a typical sweet specimen from the south), he told me of the party lovin' Spartans, and wilderness of the college life in America, his parting words:
"Stay away from parties and if you cant stay away from parties, then at least stay away from boys..." Was I in for a surprise or an extreme shock, I wondered.
I guess, every person visiting a different country has sometime or the other, sooner or later, experienced 1 thing: The Culture Shock!!! It comes; you will never go to a different land and come back without being perplexed by at least 1 of their cultural norms.
So here I was in the EL airport, a small place, no attendants, no crowd on the baggage claim.
One of my labmates, Paul Cornwell, had been gracious enough to come to pick me up at the airport twice (thanks to the Cincinnati debacle). We drove through the deserted EL roads, reached the Whitehills Drive, but where the hell was 127, Whitehills. No number, no street-light, pitch dark and thanks to my jet lag and our confusion, we knock a door. Its a lil late, I am a lil fidgety, the cowboy's words resounding in my head, on top of all this, Paul wasn't sure what kind of establishment this was, as most of the grad students (esp. Indians and Asians) lived in the university housing. Doubts were clouding my thought process and I was starting to question my decision of staying in a co-op house. Knock-knock... and a man opens the door, nude... Oh no!!! What have I got myself into!!! Shock!!! Thankfully, it wasnt 127.
I finally did reach the Vlach-Bower, a guy in a Mohawk, opens the door, Joe Riddle (my next door neighbor for next 2 yrs). I am shown my room, a very colorful lil room, and then I am frisked to the kitchen. A few more people are introduced to me, Devin, Zack, Henna E., Mike, all my future housemates... Frankly, I dint remember anyone's name except Mike's and that too because I was told this supposedly 'funny' story about him being arrested while mowing a lawn... hmm... I was fed some Peach-pie and told stuff like, "we were all sooooooo excited about you coming to live with us", and "there were whispers about you in the house..." :) There were no questions about India or my origins but after the little rendezvous I knew, we will all give each other a lot of shocks in days and months to come...

Next day... I remember, someone screaming my name at the top of his voice, enter Pavan Vangipuram (my BFF, and this was pre-decided by the way, even before he had seen me, he had written me a long mail and told me all about himself). He was my guide for the day (and also for the subsequent year), showed me around. The Union, the clock tower, the Engineering Building, MSU Dairy store, (had my 1st "American" ice-cream), and the strip (that's what we call our downtown) it is just a strip... Grand River Ave... food chain, book-store, coffee-shop, food chain, food chain, food chain, book-store, coffee-shop, coffee-shop, apparel, gym, apparel, Big-ten Burrito (my 1st "American-ised" food :P)... that's all there was, and then he thought, what else does Kajal, the newbie, need to see in "America". And so he takes me to Oz, my first head-shop and introduces me Laurie, the owner of the shop and there in the most unlikely place, I get my first "American" hug... I was in tears, but that was the best welcome ever.
Since then, though I have never been to Oz again, the Big-ten Burrito has shut down, Pavan has left for New York to be a journalist, and Vlach-Bower has been renamed to Bower House, MSU has been my home and Bower has been my love...

I seldom got time to mingle with my housemates during the school days, but there are few things that will always be special for me:

Devin making masala-chai, traditional Indian style (took him half an hr)
Joe's ever changing hair-color
Dancing in a Folk fest with MaryHelen, Cole, Jac
The first dinner (Chaos in the kitchen literally) and then we all sat out in the garden (was a lil tough for me to swallow, thanks to the excessive Rosemary)
Fire-pit on a cold fall night drinking tea, and making music
Winter break, trip to UP
The Thursday night potlucks
Fiona's cookies and Simon's Banana bread
Friendships (sp. Rachel and Ginni) and the tearful farewells
House-meetings, house-chores,...
I did attend a few wild parties but soon gave up realizing they weren't wild enough for me ;)