Freshers' week

Well, well, well... Where to begin???

What's a fresher?

For those of you who are unfamiliar with this word, a fresher is some one who is new (or 'fresh') to a university, here in the UK. Which I am.

What happens at a freshers' week?

And, so that every fresher can make the most of their year(s) at uni, but also to advertise for themselves, the various student bodies and clubs and societies, as well as quite a few companies that can be of relevance for our stay in Glasgow (night clubs, pizzerias, telephone companies, etc.) are here on campus for us and organise loads of events, give us freebies ranging from free pizza through sim cards to music compilations. There are also taster sessions for all sports available at the sports centres and special events only accessible to fresher's pass owners.

What is a fresher's pass?

Well, it is a laminated card with a picture of you and your name (preferably misspelt ;-)) which costs 35 pounds and enables you to attend a lot of events for free during freshers' week, most of them require that you make friends as more than half of them can be listed under 'club night' or 'ball', including the very first night. And it also enables you to queue for hours to said events, as ALL freshers want to attend the same events as you do, and there are a lot of them ^^. And even if only half of them (as there are usually 2 events each night) do, that's still a hell of a lot of people. So you get quite disappointed the first 2 days when you always end up sipping a drink in the unions' bars or going to the very same union club, which you could obviously do any time of the year, but then you get to meet loads of people (but let's face it, not at the paying events ;o)) who are in the same situation as you and just want to make friends. It would have been even better if more of my fellow freshers' had been as old or as mature as the ones I've befriended (I'm in no way making a criticism. I just mean that I didn't feel like it's harder to find 17-year-olds you can relate to when you're 'already' 21 and have lived and worked away from home in a foreign country for 2 years already. It is yet possible to find like-minded people in this bunch, even when you don't know a soul in the first place and don't stay in halls with 80% of the freshers :), and anyway you've got one year to make friends, but it's just this urge you feel to make the most of your 35 pounds that makes you even more anxious about making friends than you would have been in the first place, cause you don't want to go to this foam beach party on your own! (or at least I don't))

What were the highlights of my freshers' week? :)

1) All the people I've met and who, for some of them, will hopefully become or remain friends

2) The freshers' fair

It had all these stalls for clubs and societies, and I just had the time of my life (or at least a very good time) just chatting with nearly every single one of them and asking who they were (as well as signing up for their mailing lists :D). I'll tell you more about the clubs and societies in further blogging ;o)

3) The hypnotist

Oh my god, that was really impressive! After seeing that, I can confirm that at least some people can be hypnotised (or else the 10 or so students the hypnotist picked were the best actors I'd ever seen...)

4) The freshers' address

That's what's on the picture above. It was the start of fresher week, and we had various people welcoming you (including our very own rector, former leader of the LibDems and former president of the Glasgow University Union Charles Kennedy, who was elected by the students and whose main role is to give a speech at the freshers' address - no kidding ^_^').

The address was:

- given in a gorgeous-looking hall which looked even nicer than Hogwarts Great Hall as it was much more colourful ;-)

- signed for the deaf and hearing impaired

- filmed live by the student tv crew for the people who couldn't see the speakers from their seats

- full of freshers' helpers from the 4 student bodies who made it feel more like a rugby game than like a freshers' address and that's what I like about this university (I have no idea how it works in other UK universities): a combination of both high academic standards and a thriving student life the university pride themselves in instead of denying it ;-)

I hope this article wasn't too long for you to read and at least a bit interesting (do say so in the comments, if so!).

xxx

XL

Wen two thRee, wen two thRee...

Hi, guys! :)

Today was quite quiet (muahaha!). Nils's parents went back to France after spending a couple of days with us, and today we went to the Byres Road (the main road of the West End, which is the western part of Glasgow and has the University of Glasgow and our flat as well) so I could have my picture taken for the Freshers' Pass (and possibly for the student ID as well, but I haven't heard a lot about registration so far).

And then we went grocery shopping at TEEESSSSCOOO's (it's much smaller than the one in Slough, though, and you need to put one pound coins into the trolleys to be able to use them, just like in France :o)), and I used a shopping list application on my ipod for the first time (interesting, huh? :p)

Now, I suppose you'll be more interested in hearing about tonight's CEILIDH (pronounced 'ka-ee-leed, at least in the lovely Scottish accent) than about my exciting trip to Tesco's or my iPod's personal life ^_^

So, tonight was the welcome CEILIDH. It was organised by one of the 2 unions of the University of Glasgow (the Queen Margaret Union, which used to be only for women, which is why there are 2 of them). A ceilidh is a traditional Scottish ball, with couple and group dances. It's REAL fun and there's a lot of jumping and turning around, and after only 2 dances in a row I thought my heart was gonna explode! What's great with this type of dances is also that you don't need to know any one to join in and enjoy it :). Plus, the three musicians (a drummer, a bassist and an accordionist) and the QMU volunteers were being very helpful and showed us how to do the dances. Quite a few of the male volunteers were even wearing kilts! (the traditional 'skirt' for men) You can catch a glimpse of one coming from the left on the following video towards the end:

As you can (or rather cannot) see, the ceilidh took place in the QMU's very own 'night club' ^_^

Tomorrow [well, this morning, now, due to technical issues uploading the video :D] will be the start of Freshers' week, and I'll update you a bit later about that. There will be plenty of events organised by the 4 student organisations and also registration for my master's course on Wednesday.

Write to you soon :)

xx

XL

There at last!

Hi, guys!

So, I arrived in Glasgow yesterday, and, as an international student, I was welcomed by students from all the Glaswegian universities and could get a free bus ride to the uni :) I knew it before, and I had registered, but you could also register when you arrived. These volunteers were usually foreigners as well, probably because they tended to be part of the international societies, and they've organised welcoming committees every day at the airport and central station for about 2 weeks from about 9am to 6pm! O_o

I thought that was a great idea, as many students have never been in Glasgow before, and some of them have never even been abroad (especially the non-European ones), so being welcomed by friendly students and driven straight to their accomodation is a big plus, as you can feel very lost and stressed out when you first arrive in a foreign country (the most stressful being public transport, especially buses, since with a cab you can still give them the address and just relax.

So after I got to the uni and chatted with very nice people from so many countries (mainly European, but a couple of Indians as well), they kindly called me a cab and it cost only £3 to get to the flat I'm gonna be sharing for a year with Nils (he's my boyfriend), who's live here for nearly 2 years now). I must say it was so good to not have to look for accommodation and roughly know where I was going this time, although there certainly was some kind of appeal to the feeling of 'lostness' I had 2 years ago when I moved to Slough in England (and even then I directly met with people who knew the place and were to share a house with me, but I knew nothing about transport, had to open a bank account and just get used to living somewhere else, 'on my own', which was the first time for me, who'd never left my hometown in France for more than 3 months in a row ^_^)

I should get going now, got loads of things to do, including getting myself a Freshers' Pass (I will tell you about freshers' week in my next note :o))

xxx

XL