Many students who are away from home for the first time must adjust to living with a stranger in such close proximity. Some are fortunate enough to become very close to their new roomies and form a strong bond right away.
Unfortunately for some UB students, their roommates are more comparable to Snooki than Rachel from Friends and have to deal with smelly, rude or downright repulsive living partners.
"I think my roommate, Jessie, might be a nudist," said Crystal Vestal, freshman undecided major. "She never has clothes on - except when she goes to class - and every time a boy comes over, he's nude, too. I mean, it's her life choice. Who am I to tell her to put a bra on?"
Vestal often hears weird noises coming from the other side of the room, like the grunting and groaning of a suckling pig or the shrill shriek of a banshee. Many times, she doesn't want to interrupt her roommate's daily prayers - she hears the continual repetition of phrases like, "get on your knees," "Beg for forgiveness" or "Oh, God!"
Resident Adviser Carl Harville, a senior English major, has seen his fair share of eclectic pairs come through his floor.
One girl, according to Harville, would sit in her dorm room - in the now-deserted Schoellkopf Hall - and listen to her roommate's telephone conversations. She sat behind her desk with headphones in, with no music or sound was streaming through them, and wrote down everything her roommate said.
"Her life was so depressingly boring and sad that she was forced to steal topics of conversations," Harville said. "Once her roommate found out, that's when it got awkward. Even more awkward when I had to write up the creeper's roommate for having sexual relations on her bed."
Another freshman resident, according to Harville, would walk around the floor with a loaf of wheat - never white - bread in his hand, as he stroked each and every door in the girls' wing of Schoellkopf Hall.
There was also a boy who was too lazy to walk to the bathroom, so he decided to pee in an empty Gatorade bottle on his roommate's side of the room, according to Harville.
"He missed," Harville said. "It went everywhere. We aren't friends anymore."
Not all roommates are so combative, however. Some are incredibly close - sometimes too close.
"I have separation anxiety," said Timothy Carmack, a sophomore communication major. "I used to sleep in bed with my parents when I was scared or just lonely. Good thing I have a roommate now, so I can just crawl and cuddle up next to him. We're really close like that."
His roommate, Mithun Alam, a sophomore biological science major and international student from India, believes Carmack's behavior is simply a part of American culture. Alam's goal is to fit into his new environment and said he just "goes with the flow."
Carmack's previous roommate was not as easygoing.
Eric Gerber, a senior mathematics major, was a heavy sleeper while dorming with Carmack. He didn't realize Carmack would crawl into his bed in the middle of the night until a floor mate asked him if he and Carmack were "together."
Gerber immediately transferred to a school in Florida and cannot be reached for comment at this time.
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