Today we are joined by Madalina telling us the exciting stories behind three random items she brought to college.

In this episode of the RoomHop: Three Things series we are joined by Madalina, a Barnard first-year, who will tell us about three seemingly random yet very important things that she could not come to college without. Buckle up and let’s dive in!

1. Meet Pickles: a child of a happy friend group.

Like a true COVID child, Pickles (they/them) is very close to their family members. Given birth to in a Maine Build-a-Bear shop, Pickles has something given to them by each member of Madalina’s friend group from home. One person picked the color of the frog, the other picked the sound it would make when pressed on the paw (which turned out to be the roar of a dinosaur!), while the other friends chose the clothing of the frog. As Madalina noted, “it’s the combination of [their] friend group in the child”, and I think this makes Pickles a beautiful symbol of a true, close friendship. Every couple months or so, “the child gets passed on”, meaning that Pickles circulates around the friend group to have an opportunity to live with each one of their parents.

What started as a fun way to spend a day in the mall, Pickles’s life story became an adorable and creative example of maintaining a connection with hometown friends when separated by going off to college. When asked whether her roommate feels overshadowed by Pickles’s beauty and excellence, Madalina simply stated: “You know what, I hope she does. With Pickles, I hope she does”.

2. An empty plastic water bottle from a Japanese 7/11.

A reminder of a school trip to a different continent or a memorabilia of a time Madalina chugged down four liters of water in an airport security line? This big, empty water bottle carries a whimsical history behind its alluring exterior. As Madalina and her travel buddies quickly learned, traveling around Japan in June gets you dehydrated pretty quickly, so Madalina had a wonderful idea of buying two big, two-liter water bottles to keep their group alive and well. As the trip was about to end, the travel group was about to board an 11-hour flight back home. “And you know what happens in the air? You get dehydrated!”, exclaimed Madalina as she was giving the rationale behind her filling up two of the same chunky water bottles to the top before entering the airport. Unfortunately, Madalina’s survival instinct did not account for airlines not allowing such a humongous amount of liquid into the flight, so she had no better idea other than to empty the water bottles by drinking all of their contents while waiting in the security line…

One of the two empty water bottles somehow made it back to Maine and kept sitting around in Madalina’s house until its re-discovery by Madalina when visiting home during Thanksgiving break. And this time, Madalina was determined to take the infamous water bottle with her to Barnard, as “sometimes you just need two liters of water right?”

3. Homemade honey from Madalina’s grandparents.

The last but certainly not least object to star in this episode of our series is an emptied plastic honey container filled with homemade honey sent by Madalina’s grandparents all the way from Moldova to her family’s home in Maine. Although an amazing tradition, getting this kind of homemade honey raised Madalina’s honey standards a whole lot, as any store-bought types of honey are described by her as “kinda sucky”. While she likes using this special treat from acacia trees as sweetening different types of food, her all-time favorite use of honey is putting it in her tea. that’s what Madalina told me as I could hear the kettle for a new freshly brewed cup already boiling.

Big thanks to Madalina for joining us today and for letting us get to know her better through these three objects with exciting stories that she brought to her college dorm! Stay tuned for more articles in this series and feel free to hit up Bwog’s Tips if you want to be featured in any of the upcoming episodes! Peace out!

All images via Author