How much experience did your roommate have before school? Was he/she cooking a lot from an early age? Or grow up in a culinary environment?
I know that I am not the swiftest person around and I see people that pick up on things easier than I do sometimes. It happens. Maybe your roommate is more passionate or has a natural knack for this type of work. Things don't always come as easy for some as they do others. They just have to work harder to make up for it.
Like my quote mentioned. Just experience as much as you can and pay attention to what you are experiencing is your best bet imo. Expose yourself to as much as possible.
Recently my whole life has been food related. I am at school learning, or on websites reading menus or how to do certain things, reading books / magazines, watching cooking shows, experimenting at home, creating recipes, volunteering at school for prep, practicing knife skills, thinking about cooking when I am not able to do any of the above. I find lately that when I am with my girlfriend (she doesn't cook) all I want to do is talk about food while she is talking about daily things. I am getting more passionate about food. That’s all I want to do.
It's not all good. I encounter problems here and there. I'm not where I feel I should be but you have to try to get past it. Some people just take longer to get to a certain point than others. That’s life. Sometimes you start off slow and things start to fall in place and work out in the end. It's not a competition. All you can do is the best YOU can do and that’s what matters at the end of the day.
Don't feel discouraged. Just expose yourself to as much as possible and try to retain all that you can.
Good luck
