ITHACA, NY The Ithaca Hotel, with its informal olden-days elegance, was a downtown musical venue before there was a Commons. "Soni & The Bravados" performed there on several occasions.
I met my Freshman year roommate on Facebook. He seemed nice enough and worried about the possibility of roommate disaster. I was happy to commit to 9 months in the same shoe box with him. The night before move-in day, my family drove up to Ithaca and we spent the night in a small hotel about 10 minutes outside of the city. I walked into the lobby, bubbling with excitement, nervous for my first day of school. My new roommate, off the plane from Taiwan, was the first face I saw.
By random chance, our families chose the same hotel to stay in that night despite all the other possibilities. That night, the fire alarm went off, and dozens of Cornell families streamed out of their rooms into the parking lot. This was my first glimpse of the community I was soon to enter and a chance to bond with my new roommate. This random confluence of events set the tone for my next four years, made magical by the unshakable marriage of fate and good fortune.