A Weekend in College: Zero Dollars
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All over the personal finance blogging community, people are seeking fun and action that is cheap and inexpensive. Many ideas have been drawn to be plausible but some will eventually cost something. I’ve been trying to leave comments on posts with my take on things to do that do not cost much. Then, I realized that living in New York City, it is very hard for fun to come at a small price.
Until this weekend when I just used up all my cash (I normally only keep about $20 cash), I was able to entertain myself with a few activities that didn’t cost me a single penny.
Played Mahjong with friends: Friday night
Mahjong is a traditional chinese game played by four players with tiles of different Chinese characters and images. In my childhood, my mom was an occassional gambler in mahjong and I learned how to play from her and her friends. This is typical of many other Asian Americans and thus, we’ve carried on to play this game. We do not play with money because gambling in mahjong can get addictive. The full game of 16 rounds that we played took up a good 3 hours.
Stony Brook University homecoming football game: Saturday afternoon
GO SEAWOLVES!! Every school places value in their pride and it is the role of a stadium full of students in the school’s color during the homecoming football game to show how proud we are. College events are always happening on campus and they are all FREE to students. Free tickets coupled with stands filled with very loud college kids rooting for our home team is VERY FUN. Plus, the Stony Brook Seawolves came back in the last minute of the game for a 21-20 win. Super Bowl déjà vu?
Watched “Quarantine” in the movie theater: Sunday night
I just recently found out that the movie theater closest to campus offers free admission after midnight. Normally, I’d go around the afternoon but never thought of going so late at night. Well, I don’t have Monday classes so why not catch a late show. My friends have a thing for zombies so we thought “Quarantine” would be a good choice. My short review: It was not a memorable film. Parts of it resembled the dizzy camera recording of “Cloverfield” . Lucky I paid nothing for it because I certainly felt cheated for the time I spent watching it!
A semester’s tuition: $7000
A weekend in college: $0
The college experience: priceless
Photo credit: bennylin0724 and SBU
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9 Comments on this post
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Suburban Survivalist said:
We have become masters of spending little to no money and having fun. One additional hint — Always have a deck of cards and 5 dice in your bag or car. So many games can be played for hours on end with good conversation!
October 23rd, 2008 at 12:51 am -
trikkk said:
an impact of global crisis ..hehehehe….i love the experiences which are priceless ,and you cant pay for that ,but buddy “NO Money No honey ” remember that
October 23rd, 2008 at 9:48 am -
carol at A Second Cup said:
Take advantage of those free football tickets now. They will cost plenty when you are out of college. Go State!
October 24th, 2008 at 10:26 am -
saph@ walk with me said:
Wow, I miss Mahjong. When was the football stadium built at StonyBrook? I was already gone then.
October 24th, 2008 at 2:27 pm -
Simon said:
@trikk: haha very true.
@saph: The stadium began construction in 2000 I think.
October 24th, 2008 at 10:34 pm -
lvs said:
For people like me having fun on a budget is by itself fun. I have never played Mahong, I have heard of it before though. But I think any game that gets the competitive spirit in you flowing can be fun.
October 25th, 2008 at 2:47 am -
Abdul said:
That game Mahjong seems pretty interesting, I must check it out and it is good that you don’t gamble, last time I gambled I lost about $500 in one day! LOL
October 26th, 2008 at 3:40 am -
flexible coupling said:
Mahjong is fun,, middle-aged or old ppl won’t feel bored so they play Mahjong…Young ppl don’t have much time to play that now
i mean here in chinaNovember 13th, 2009 at 10:33 pm
[...] Realm of Prospetiy does something truly phenomenal – he has a great weekend in college, and (are you ready for this??) doesn’t spend a single penny in the process! I’m impressed. Check out the article to see how he did it. [...]