House Dinner with the Whole House

When I was in college, I lived in a large house. The owner of the house rented it out to people that were in college. It housed 8 students altogether at any given time, and a second house next door (owned by the same person) had about 4 more. As a result of the way people learned about this house, we had a variety of local and international students that lived there. So we had Americans, South Koreans, one from Mali, one from Burkina Faso, one from Columbia, one from Zambia, a couple from Nepal; needless to say, there was a lot of interesting cultural perspectives at the table. Once a week (we usually did Thursday evenings), we'd all get together for the House Dinner. The week before, we'd decide who was going to do what part of the work - usually two people would volunteer for main dish, two or three people would do some side dishes, someone would be responsible for drinks, and another for desert. Any anyone who didn't do part of the meal would help with setting up the table or helping with cleanup afterward. Those of us preparing the meal would usually start an hour - maybe two - before the meal, to make sure whatever we were preparing would be ready at mealtime. We also had to coordinate kitchen use, which is its own challenge in a house of eight adults. So sometimes the side dishes or prep work was done beforehand. Or we'd talk with each other to make sure that everyone knew how much time we'd need for making the meal, when we were planning to do prep, who else needed to use the kitchen, and we all worked together to make sure it all worked out. I was so fortunate to be able to have foods and friendships and moments from so many different countries. We'd all sit around the table for a couple of hours, and we'd talk about the foods that we'd prepared. We'd share personal stories involving those foods, or sharing stories about our families and the cultures we belonged to. We learned about how different some of our lives were from one another, but more importantly, we also learned how much we all truly had in common. People who were far away from their homes and the people they grew up around, sometimes far away from people who even speak their own language. And yet in that house, at those dinners, we became family with each other. We shared in the victories. We celebrated the wins and the achievements and the milestones. We supported each other in life's moments of grief as well, such as when a family member across the world passes away and the roommates might not have been able to return home for the funeral because of the costs involved. After the meal was over, we'd work together on cleaning up, which is another monumental undertaking when it's a group of 12+ to clean up after! But even then, none of it ever felt like work. It felt like the most wonderful time to get to spend with each other, doing together the things that needed to be done. And afterward, we'd usually all gather in the main living room of the house. Sometimes the television would get turned on or a movie played, but more often than not, it was just a continuation of the stories we'd been telling at the dinner table. Or if a new student had moved into one of the houses that week, we'd go around telling them about who we are and getting to know them more. It was a special place, and House Dinner was always a special time. I'll have those stories my whole life long, and that's something I'm so grateful to all of those wonderful people for.