HUDS, Sweet HUDS

I love Harvard University Dining Services. This might be an uncontroversial statement to some people, but to those who have heard me expound, at length, my hatred for all dining hall-related foods — and for Annenberg Hall in particular— this statement might come as somewhat of a surprise.

But so far this year, I’ve eaten at least two meals a day, with the majority of these meals in the dining hall. I’ve also come up with a winding list of my favorite HUDS foods, a few of which are the dining hall's Tuscany chickpeas, spinach and garlic, Italian sausage subs, meatballs and spaghetti.

To emphasize the gravity of these statements, let me contextualize a little further. Contrast this to last year, when going to Annenberg (and therefore eating a proper meal) only once a day was the norm for me. And this was on weekdays, when I had class in the Yard — on weekends, in my room 500 miles away from the Yard in Pennypacker, I refused to entertain even the thought of Annenberg. On those days, it was time to crack open that trusty ramen stash, or a bag of the ever-reliable Deep River dill pickle chips occasionally sold at Lamont. (I’d buy 10 bags at a time).

This was in small part because of the distance from my room. Yes, I know, it’s barely a 10-minute walk. A seven-minute walk even, when I was really craving that Italian Wedding Soup or Tabbouleh. But, just think … seven minutes to get there, 14 minutes back and forth for dinner, 21 if you include coming back from lunch, 28 if you’re getting lunch and walking from your room … in the cold, dreary streets of Cambridge, past the squat, blocky Art Museum and the Carpenter Center, and the triangle of road that doesn’t have a sidewalk on one side — a fact that I always forget, to the detriment of the passing cars and my peace of mind — with no one to accompany me because my privileged friends have been blessed by the gods of the Freshman Dean’s Office to live in the Yard.

But, in large part, it was because I simply hated HUDS food: the vegetables that were rarely seasoned except for when they were excessively so, the green enchiladas, which had no discernable texture, Red’s Best Fresh Local Fish with Lemon Butter, Capers, and Parsley. No description needed.

In large part, it was because I hated Annenberg itself, with the noisy tables, the lines that, if you went at the wrong time — normal mealtime — would stretch out the doors and between the tables. The hundreds of strange faces, repeating the same words again and again. (What House are you in? What’s your major? What did you do over the summer / weekend / break? What classes are you taking?)

In large part, it was because I was homesick. The kitchen wasn’t a few steps away. I couldn’t cook the way I wanted to, or eat my mom’s food the way I wanted to, or see my sister, brother, mother, father, the way I wanted to. I couldn’t really go home — I mean, I could, technically, with a Greyhound bus and four-and-a-half hours — but not in the way I wanted to. Not in the way that mattered. That is, I wouldn’t truly be living there anymore — I was living here, in my dreary room with thin walls, seven (ten) minutes away from sustenance. I wouldn’t be living back home ever again. My home now was really my home, past-tense, my home, with the qualifier “childhood.” It was no longer the constant, the place to which I would return and recharge. That was now my dorm room, and I had better get used to that, I told myself, sternly, two months into the new school year.

Well, it took me the rest of the year to absorb that, and most of the summer too. But, when I came back to school this year, it was with a renewed drive, a concentrated effort to love that which I could not change, namely HUDS food. And it was with considerable surprise that I found it easy. It was easy to love the ever-reliable pasta bar, or the grill that always had my back (thanks Jose, Gary, Carlo, and Vinny!) , or the never-ending stock of Lactaid.

It was easy (or, at least, easier) to love Harvard now that I had accepted that, well, I wasn’t going back home anymore. And if I ever find myself craving my mom’s roselle fish soup or beef curry or fried noodles, I crack open my mini-fridge and dredge up some kimchi, maybe make some instant rice. Or, I head down to the Adams dining hall, where a bowl of Marshmallow Mateys will assuage the craving. Or, sometimes dinner is so good that I forget to crave my mom’s cooking, at least for a little while. To discover my love for HUDS was to discover the things about Harvard that made it feel more like a home.

Myint Kyi ’21, a Crimson Editorial comper, lives in Adams House.