My name’s Louis and I’m a resident at Sutton Place, located at 309 East John Street, just a stone’s throw away from Cosmopolitan Club. Although we don’t literally throw stones at each other, maybe we’ll eventually organize a collective activity that unleashes our primitive interests in rocks and stones–Archaeology or Geology? So anyway, just to tell you a little more about Sutton–we’re a Christian cooperative for graduate students managed by the Baptist Student Foundation (BSF). True to the graduate student image, it’s quiet amidst the masses of fraternities and sororities surrounding the neighborhood.
Sutton Place House Residents, Spring 2008 (Louis is at the far left of the 2nd row)
One myth about graduate students is that we’ll do anything for free food. Suttonnites try hard to shed that demeaning image. But a reoccurring temptation is the coffee hour at Cosmopolitan club every Thursday night. The unique cuisine painstakingly prepared weekly by internationals from different countries is hard to resist. As a cover-up to our true intention toward the sumptuous meals, we try to mingle around with coffee hour attendees. But usually that’s limited to mingling with those who are first in line to the food.
Over time, we’ve grown more familiar to Cosmonauts. Contradictory to the well-known aphorism–familiarity breeds contempt–the Cosmo residents have embraced the Suttonnites. And strangely, we’re not just enjoying the food, but the company of internationals who religiously arrive at Cosmo every Thursday night too. A cynical psychologist might speculate that individuals with similar motives acquaint better. Yet, the draw of food has become secondary to befriending students from all corners of the world. It’s always interesting to enquire about the decision making process for University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign as the school of choice, or the place to live.
A routine conversation might go (imagine in your mind several possible languages or accents):
“So why did you decide to come to Champaign?”
“They have a really good program in XX”
“Yes, I hear…” [silent yawn] Note: the dialogue becomes more intriguing after “…” Or we start talking about the wonderful food.
The Cosmo-Sutton (abbreviated as “Cotton” in my mind) relationship has been a fruitful one. Aside from hungry Suttonites visiting Cosmo, there have been many joint activities that residents from both houses participate in: bicycling trips, camping, Christmas parties, etc. Now just thinking about it, one highlight of living in Sutton is Cosmo Club. It might be that sometimes we need a break from our housemates and so try hanging out with Cosmo residents (and vice-versa). As they say, the grass is always greener on the other side; alternatively, the food is always better in your neighbor’s house.
Louis Tay is a Grad Student in Psychology from Singapore.
The “Cotton” Twins
(Sutton Place on the left, Cosmo House on the right)