How to (safely) ‘turn-up’ During a Uni ‘lock-down’
Yes, I am starting my first blog post on this site with a pun – because I want to set high standards for both you and me, and anything beginning with a pun is automatically qualified as quality content in my books (which I don’t have many of – being a Comp Sci student).
I’m Shivani, a first year Computer Science student – I’d love to say you can find me on campus, but right now I’m at home in South London (the best part of London) because of issues related to our familiar friend Covid-19. You might (understandably) assume that being at home and other Covid-19 restrictions for those even on campus has significantly impacted our university year – and while you may be right to an extent, there are always things to do to make the best out of the situation!
To help you out, I’ve come up with some ideas of how to still have a good time at uni as a fresher without ending up with Corona (from experience, of course)! Hopefully, restrictions will be eased come next year – but who knows what could happen – perhaps this might come in useful 10, 20 or 1000s of years in the future. (If this is one of the last blog posts left about life in the 2020s though – I’d just like to confirm that we all agree that it’s milk then cereal – thank you).
- Especially in the first few days of arriving on campus – try to spend less time in your room and more time in the kitchen.
During the first term, most of us on campus were restricted in terms of where we could go – leading to a lot of stories of students spending the majority of their time in their rooms. Although this may be a safe space to be in – it can lead to you feeling even more isolated from everyone else, possibly making it even harder to leave your room to talk to others.
To prevent this, try to spend more time in the kitchen from the start – where else can you spark up interesting conversations, learn how to cook better (or just learn how to cook) from your flatmates and bond over killing hornets? This will also make your flat feel more like a home and your flatmates feel more like people you can turn to for advice.
- Organise movie nights, theme nights, game nights, cooking nights and everything in between with your flatmates!
This ties in with my first point – there are an endless number of things you all can do together that require minimal time, money and effort: all you need for a movie night is a movie, popcorn and people- and you’re giving the Student Cinema a run for their money. Theme nights are especially fun – as you can let everyone in the flat pick a theme and pull one out of the hat every week. This can include dressing up, organising games, TV shows and food related to the theme.
- Meet up with your course-mates
As well as the social side, university is also a place for you to go to get a degree. In this case it would be reassuring to know a couple of people on your course to talk the content over with, complain about lecturers with and cry with when it’s the night before and you have ½ of your coursework not yet existing.
Due to Covid, it was slightly harder to meet people due to all of our lectures and seminars being online – although luckily, my Computer Science WhatsApp group chat arranged a couple of meet-ups by the Piazza over the first couple days of term – giving people the opportunity to get to know each other! But if you can’t make it, not to worry! I was in a flat lockdown during that time so couldn’t attend. In this case – subject group chats are your best friend. You already have 100s of numbers of people in your course – so why not reach out to them?! If I didn’t do this, I wouldn’t have gotten to know some of the people I talk to the most now – so it’s definitely worth a try.
- Enjoy some ‘alone time’
Ok, I understand how this might not be directly related to having the best social life 24 hours a day, but everyone (even you) needs to take time out to relax. Whether this is watching Netflix, knitting, playing an instrument or talking to family and friends back home – ensuring you are looking after and spending time with yourself is one of the best things you can do to ensure when you’re back out with everyone, you’re giving them and yourself the best version of you.
These are just a couple of ideas about how you can make the most of lockdown life – whether you’re spending it at uni or at home. If you would like any more ideas, have any questions or just want to talk – message me and I’d love to chat with you! See you soon! xx
