The Rawtarian Community
The Rawtarian Community is one of the largest online raw food communities. In addition to this community forum, you can browse and search thousands of community recipes added by over 5000 talented Rawtarian Community members just like you!
Visit The Community
Comments
WOW very very hard!
Let’s see. Where do I start? I went to Boston University for my first semester. It had a pretty good variety of fresh produce and an extensive salad bar (probably nothing organic, but I didn’t know much about organic at the time). I lived off fruit salad from the market below my dorms which were about 5$ each and I would have like 3 a day, which I wouldn’t recommend because I wasn’t getting nearly enough calories as I needed- but that’s a different story. So that worked out for me fine and I was eating 100%, just not 100% organic.
Flash forward to December. I went home for the holidays and my family thought I had gotten too skinny when they expected me to gain the “freshman 15”. They told me I was being unhealthy and made me eat cooked foods (ironic, right?). So I did and gained back a lot of my weight and felt really sluggish and terrible all the time.
By the end of winter break, I had transferred to a well-known tech school in my home state. It’s VERY small and very different from Boston University. Limited diversity and limited variety. Due to the struggle of adjusting to a new college as a mere second semester Freshman and putting a strain on my body with copious amounts of cooked food – I had fell into depression!
Once I got to my new school, I planned on getting right back into the swing of things and sticking to raw, but man was it hard! I was trying to come out of my depression, trying to pass my courses (which were 10x harder than my previous courses!), and just adapt & make friends. This school has a mandatory meal plan that comes with meal “points” or “bills” as we call them. These can be used at the various fast food places around town. That said: I took advantage of those places during times of high stress and began to feel even worse!
Also, part of the meal plan is unlimited meals at the dining hall. Our cafeteria is terrible and the only form of produce are mealy apples and mushy bananas. I guess I shouldn’t have had high expectations since the school only has about 500 undergrads LOL
Anyway, back to the topic at hand: I don’t know your specific situation, but here are some tips I can offer you:
(1) Freshman year seems easy at first, but the heavy coursework comes hard and fast. You’ll want to be prepared for that so make sure you take advantage of your free time the first couple weeks of school.
(2) You won’t need to spend much money during the week because you’ll be going to class, doing homework, making friends, joining clubs, attending meetings, etc.
(3) You MAY want to get a part-time job or a job on campus. They tend to be VERY flexible with hours and even if you just work a few hours on the weekends, it will easily help you buy your raw goodies. I work at the front desk of our athletic center and I work whenever I want for as long as I want. Loans are covering my education and I’ve paid for room & board so my weekly groceries are all I really spend money on.
(4) If you’re going to school in a large city make sure to avoid high-end specialty shops. At my new school, there is a Kings nearby. I don’t know if you’re familiar with that supermarket, but it’s very specialized and although organic, expensive. I tend to stick to the small asian markets because I have found amazing deals there lately.
(5) I know this one is going to be hard, but- I found it easier if I generally ate the same foods daily. I knew what I needed to buy, what I was going to eat, and when I was going to eat it and it took away all unnecessary stress that meal planning sometimes causes.
Hmm, that’s all I can think of right now. I hope this helped. Let me know if you’ve got anymore questions!
Kait
I created an account at my bank just for food! That way I can budget accordingly, always putting money in and taking money out. I’ve never found it to be extraordinarily tight because I keep it really simple, just because I’m always in a time crunch. It’s turned into fresh, whole foods, in their wholest of their whole form for easy munching on the go! Buying from farmers markets saves a WHOLE buncha cash, and if you have roomies, ask them to pitch in
Wow! that seperate bank account for food idea sounds like a very good one to me!! :) I might have to try it, I mean otherwise, I can just go crazy at the grocery store!! lol sorrry, I can’t really add any advice since I haven’t even officially started college either.. just PSEO. but I’m starting in the fall so the above advice was good for me to! Gracias!!