BU Cafeteria: A Fringe Lifestyle

Location: Literally, definitely right behind Fenway Park, conveniently located on BU's campus

I first started visiting Boston my freshman year of college because I had high school friends who went to college there. This is not a post about that unmitigated disaster. The first couple of times I visited I definitely looked like a vagrant because I somehow never had the appropriate bag to travel with so always wound up just stuffing my clothes into a plastic bag. I subsequently mastered light traveling with a backpack and things started looking up for old Kathy S.

In my Benjamin Button years...

Anyway, last weekend, my roommate and I braved the Fung Wah (the name that launched a thousand puns) and arrived in Boston around dinner time with a small suitcase and an air mattress in an at the time stately Macy's bag. (Of course, the fact that we got into the city around 6:40 meant that we were stuck in traffic for 45 minutes coming in which prompted Johnny to send multiple texts expressing his anger and puzzlement over the fact that we did not control the speed and time of arrival of the bus. Sample texts include: "Wrap it up!!! Are you still in traf???")

Finally, we got on the T...and promptly headed to a dining hall looking homeless, and, honestly, treating BU like a soup kitchen. Johnny opened the haggling over 1 meal swipe for 5 people with the words, "So you think I could get 3 meal swipes for the price of 1?" After expressing sincere dismay over the worker's refusal, citing precedent, things seemed to be getting worse. The meal-swiper (pretty sure that's the official title) called our friend out on trying to sneak in, he countered with asking that she give us 5 meals for the price of one swipe, and sensing that her resistance was futile and that she was working for Big Dining, she gave in and let us all in for free.

And so we marched in, triumphant, dragging a breaking suitcase and a bag with steadily enlarging holes in it. But no matter. On to the food stations. BU had a nice assortment--some pasta, salad bar, sandwiches, a carving station, burritos (but watch out for who's wrapping them...). Everyone had one or two servings; Johnny decided to go around the world. After a return visit to the sandwich station, Johnny set the sandwich down and concluded that the sandwich would "do [him] dirty" but the man would not be stymied by this fact. In general, Johnny lives like he is preparing for an imminent apocalypse or at the very least total economic collapse. He has stated that he will "eat anything, anytime, anywhere for any reason," and never leaves the dining hall without stealing some fruit. Maybe I'm just myopic, though.

A sandwich like this one could very well do you dirty.

Although Johnny's eating habits are similar to those of a generation that survived WWII, those of his friend are even stranger. While she complained about the fact that he takes forever to eat, Johnny described her eating habits as those exhibited by feral children raised by Asian wolves (she is Asian), and reminisced, like a haunted man, about times when she has gotten 4 or 5 rotisserie chickens and eaten only the skins. They are, after all, where all the nutrients are stored.

Conclusion: Powerplay or be powerplayed.