I finished my first year at Uni a little over a month ago. I complained early on about various things. Some of those things didn't much change, others did.
After completing an entire year I'm still not entirely sure I fit there. I love the lectures and the atmosphere during the daytime but I was not somebody who was made for a nightlife! However towards the end of the year as money ran out and study became important people made less noise between midnight and 5am and I was able to get actual REM sleep.
The thing I would personally describe as the worst thing about living in halls is the fire alarms. Sure I know we need them, and I get that they need to be tested them, I don't mind them doing that during daylight hours for about 30 seconds. What was an issue was that at least once a week someone would come home drunk in the middle of the night and in their drunken state set the fire alarm off. There were 22 flats in my building, and with a fire alarm in every room it's unsurprising they were set off with some frequency.
The fire alarm situation was epitomised by two incidents. The first was when, only two days after moving in, a guy in my flat decided to defrost a bagel in the microwave for 10 minutes while he went outside for a smoke. The result being that the bagel turned to charcoal, our flat was a solid smoke field and he earned himself the name Arty Bagel for the rest of the year.
The second incident was when at about Midnight the entire building was evacuated, by this point we knew the procedure, go down the stairs, mill around outside for roughly 5 minutes while you waited for security to turn up and send you back in. We were quite surprised when this time we were greeted by an RA running towards us in dressing gown and slippers 'GET AWAY FROM THE BUILDING'. We had to stay outside for over an hour that night, turned out someone's laptop had blown up...
In February this year, the very weekend my boyfriend came to stay with me for his birthday, someone else had a friend to stay. They went out for the night and got paralytic. They came back at 2am and my flatmate went to bed putting his friends up in the kitchen without access to a toilet. We were woken up not much later to very loud blasphemous cursing. My boyfriend, poor boyfriend, went out to investigate and was met by poo. Turns out the friend had pooed and then smeared it up and down our corridor and kitchen. The worst part, this 'friend' actually was in the same flat at a different Uni as one of my high school friends. For weeks we would walk around campus greeted by the phrase 'You're from that flat aren't you?' 'Yes, turns out we are.' 'I feel so sorry for you. I just don't understand why!'
There were many and various other things happen in and around our flat including but not exclusive to; flooding, kitchen coitus and a very Sheldon-like *knock knock knock* 'George' *knock knock knock* 'George' *knock knock knock* 'George'!
Turns out I like lectures, but not halls. Who would've guessed?
What were your Uni experiences like?
Rowen
After completing an entire year I'm still not entirely sure I fit there. I love the lectures and the atmosphere during the daytime but I was not somebody who was made for a nightlife! However towards the end of the year as money ran out and study became important people made less noise between midnight and 5am and I was able to get actual REM sleep.
The thing I would personally describe as the worst thing about living in halls is the fire alarms. Sure I know we need them, and I get that they need to be tested them, I don't mind them doing that during daylight hours for about 30 seconds. What was an issue was that at least once a week someone would come home drunk in the middle of the night and in their drunken state set the fire alarm off. There were 22 flats in my building, and with a fire alarm in every room it's unsurprising they were set off with some frequency.
The fire alarm situation was epitomised by two incidents. The first was when, only two days after moving in, a guy in my flat decided to defrost a bagel in the microwave for 10 minutes while he went outside for a smoke. The result being that the bagel turned to charcoal, our flat was a solid smoke field and he earned himself the name Arty Bagel for the rest of the year.
The second incident was when at about Midnight the entire building was evacuated, by this point we knew the procedure, go down the stairs, mill around outside for roughly 5 minutes while you waited for security to turn up and send you back in. We were quite surprised when this time we were greeted by an RA running towards us in dressing gown and slippers 'GET AWAY FROM THE BUILDING'. We had to stay outside for over an hour that night, turned out someone's laptop had blown up...
In February this year, the very weekend my boyfriend came to stay with me for his birthday, someone else had a friend to stay. They went out for the night and got paralytic. They came back at 2am and my flatmate went to bed putting his friends up in the kitchen without access to a toilet. We were woken up not much later to very loud blasphemous cursing. My boyfriend, poor boyfriend, went out to investigate and was met by poo. Turns out the friend had pooed and then smeared it up and down our corridor and kitchen. The worst part, this 'friend' actually was in the same flat at a different Uni as one of my high school friends. For weeks we would walk around campus greeted by the phrase 'You're from that flat aren't you?' 'Yes, turns out we are.' 'I feel so sorry for you. I just don't understand why!'
There were many and various other things happen in and around our flat including but not exclusive to; flooding, kitchen coitus and a very Sheldon-like *knock knock knock* 'George' *knock knock knock* 'George' *knock knock knock* 'George'!
Turns out I like lectures, but not halls. Who would've guessed?
What were your Uni experiences like?
Rowen
That sounds awful! I've lived off-campus with either my parents or my wife the entire time I've gone to college, so my experiences have been limited to lectures. No poop on the kitchen walls for me.
ReplyDeleteIt wasn't exactly a highlight of my year :) I would've loved to have stayed at home, but my local Uni didn't teach maths, so I had to move. On a brighter note I'm off campus next year :D
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