<p>Hey guys, so I'm probably not using this forum for what it was meant for by asking this but I'm in a pretty serious bind (okay it's immature). So me and a pretty good friend of mine got into UCI and he wants to room with me however I know him.... he's not hygienic, not very considerate, farts a lot (on purpose), is very messy, etc. But in addition to that, I want to meet new people. Any thoughts on how I can avoid this without having to be straight forward or telling the truth? I know this is dumb.... but I really want a good college first year experience while maintaining our friendship. I will be straightforward when i can't find any other options but any help would be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>Never room with a high school friend freshman year because both roommates then tend to spend more time together and not meet as many new people. If you both room with new people but remain friends, you both expand your social circles much faster, and that’s an important part to getting acclimated to college quickly.</p>
<p>It’s better to be blunt, don’t dance around the issue. This happend to my son, his freshman roommate who he got randomly assigned ended up being his best friend…sophomore year the roommate wanted to room elsewhere, but he kept dancing around the issue or even lying so when my son didn’t get to room with him again he was more angry then sad. Don’t be that guy, instead just tell him you want to meet new people…tell him you can live in the same building if he wants (and if your uni is able) that way he won’t be as bummed. But bottom line, tell the truth and be honest.</p>
<p>Agree with the previous posts. It’s hard to say no to a friend, but the drawbacks to rooming with someone you already know well are many. College truly is the time to expand your circle of friends.</p>
<p>As a freshman, my d wound up rooming with someone who had been a good friend of hers in middle school, then moved OOS. They were thrilled to be assigned to the same room, but within 2 weeks it was obvious that they had each changed profoundly. They just irritated each other for the rest of the semester, and barely said hello when they’d run into each other on campus during the next three years. </p>
<p>It’s fine to put what you want first sometimes. This is one of those times.</p>
<p>Best way to ruin friendship is to room with HS friends. You will both become different people on the college campus than you are in HS. You want to grow and meet many people from other places.</p>
<p>A good compromise is for you to both request teh same dorm so you can be close to each other but sitll have plenty of times to make new friends.</p>
<p>I don’t think it’s immature at all to not want to room with someone who is " not hygienic, not very considerate, farts a lot (on purpose), is very messy, etc."</p>
<p>If you want to preserve the friendship – I’d go with the “I want to meet new people thing” It’s legitimate. Probably best to avoid the farts alot thing. If your friend gets upset (perhaps part of ‘not very considerate’) then he’s not much of a friend.</p>
<p>Originally, a friend of mine from high school asked me to room with her and I was just straightforward and told her I wanted to meet new people but we could still hang out all the time. Later, I decided to room with her because I wanted the comfort of it (I chickened out a little haha). It turned out great - we weren’t best friends before hand but now we’re really close. I honestly think it was just luck that we worked out so well. I’ll be living in a single this year, but only because I had been threatening to transfer most of the year haha. Hopefully, I’ll have sort of the people-meeting experience with the other girls in my hall this year.</p>
<p>Bottom line, you’ll both feel better if you’re on the same page. Don’t lie - but definitely mention that not rooming together won’t end your friendship and you’ll still hang out with them on campus.</p>
<p>Agree with all the posters above. Probably the easiest thing to do is tell him that you don’t want to take any chances on screwing up your friendship by rooming together. Just keep repeating that line as kindly as possible until it finally sinks in with him. (And whatever you do, DO NOT AGREE TO ROOM WITH HIM. You will end up killing him eventually if you do.)</p>
<p>OP, when one of my sons was faced with your situation I had him use me as the “bad guy.” He told his friend that his parents insisted that he live with someone he did not know as a way of expanding his world…and that of course they would still be friends and this way they would meet even more people and expand both of their social circles, etc. You can also tell him that he is such a good friend that you are afraid the friendship could be strained if you argued about roommate issues like hours or guests in the room, etc.</p>
<p>And then just fill out your housing form without requesting him as your roommate.</p>