House of Sulo

I lived in this boarding-​style house for my sophomore year at Cal and I can honestly say it was my favorite living situation to date. It is a large house that has about 13 rooms over two stories. Some are very large and can be shared by two people (as my roommate and I did) and others are scarcely bigger than a closet. But we all shared three bathrooms, a kitchen, study/​dining area, and a backyard. It has since been updated and looks quite sleek and beautiful.
At the time, I was paying $ 550 to share a room, which, looking back, is astronomical even for Berkeley. But my roommate and I got along well so there wasn’t often problems.
The important part is the community. There were 15 people living in that place, not including Sulo the property manager who lived in the garage. This eccentric, slightly crazy Turkish man decided who got to inhabit the house. So there were a lot of artist/​musicial types which was pretty cool.
I made friends here that I still keep in touch with. It was so much fun because no matter what time of the day, there was always someone to hang out with. On top of all this, Sulo threw 4 or 5 parties for us over the course of the year, These included food, alcohol, and some form of entertainment (a band, bellydancing) and we could invite whomever we wanted.
This was truly a fun and worthwhile year. Though it was expensive for the space I got, I gained experiences that I could not have found elsewhere. This is a community, not an apartment.