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Fed up with this student bullshit

• Daniel Budden
• 21 Mar 2007 18:00

I am fed up with the 'student myth.' Facebook is the latest culprit. All those tired, clichéd ideas about what a student is in those groups with titles such as "You know you're a student when..." which imply that unless you spend all day watching Scrubs and eating supernoodles, your status as a student is somehow inferior and you are fraudulent in some way and should wear a t-shirt branded "I'm not a real student."

Not all students match that quite diagreeably unpleasant, clichéd mould chucked about by Channel 4 soaps and chain emails - "you spend all night partying and all day sleeping." Some students have families, some are working hard and getting on with it, and a lot of us are just self-confessed geeks. Watching alpha types trying to out-do each other by trying to embody the student myth is toe-curling, having to share a bar with them: mildly tortourous. There's nothing wrong with being a party-animal, but it's not a competition gentlemen!

In light of this I have tried to come up with my own, non-bullshit list of things that I have learned from 4 years in this splendid institution. Feel free to add your own additions through the comments button.

The hill in Singleton Park gets steeper every year. I mean this literally, I think it's due to erosion of the soil.

Every week you will get an email about the ECDL, and every week you'll think what a good idea it is...but you never do it. Alternative ending: you go to the first meeting, discover it costs over £100, and then never do it.

There are never any teaspoons.

50% of the emails you receive will invite you to take part in a pyschology experiment 'for my dissertation.'

Nothing soaks a t-shirt faster than washing a teaspoon.

You always forget to avoid campus like the plague on SU or AU election day. (I'm going to the library instead of staying in bed all day because I have work to do, not because I want to listen to your crap mate!)

Ok I'll let you off with this one. It really does always rain in Swansea.

A lot of people hate students. Very often because of jealousy. Which is not totally unfair: we do get it pretty easy compared to real people with real jobs (how many of us actually spend 9+ hours a day working? Really? Every day?). The only downside is the relative lack of money. But let's be honest with each other - we're among friends here - if we had had more, then most of us would have been drunk more often and ended up just as skint. We are very lucky and privileged to be students. The best way to appreciate that is to enjoy your time, whether you spend it all in JCs or the library - but it's also important to acknowledge that privilege from time to time, because not everyone is as lucky as you.

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I try

• Daniel Budden
• 26 Feb 2007 12:00

I went to watch the Ospreys and I was confused.

And it wasn't from not knowing anything about rugby. On the contrary, nearly every games lesson during my wintry childhood was spent gleefully chasing the egg. A good teacher and plenty of practice meant that although I was nothing special, I was a keen yet not completely useless player.

But there was a problem. For the non-locals: in a South Wales valley school they assume you are familiar with the rules of rugby before your parents have even taught you how to wipe your bum. But having only come to Wales at the age of 4, I must have missed the boat somewhere.

So although I knew intimately how to tackle, throw and conduct myself in the various positions, I was not very sure of what was actually going on at any point. It was a bit like teaching somebody how to drive - how to handle the gearbox and control the steering - and then letting them out on the road without telling them what side to drive on.

It was always going to lead to disaster. Injuries to first-team players gave me my first opportunity for the school team, and it was only thanks to the pleading of the entire squad that "it's his first game ref" that I was not sent off. To this day, I still don't know what I did wrong.

Enter the Ospreys. I thoroughly enjoyed watching how the backs made dummy runs, zig-zagging around each other, and how the forwards would drive over the ball as a single unit. But every so often the proceedings seemed to stop for some reason. And then someone would have a kick. And then everyone would cheer. Or groan. Now and again the referee would get bored, and make them have a scrum in the hope that the players would entertainingly crack their heads together. Line-outs seemed to be attributed randomly.

In the end they won 31-10. I know how but I know not why.

P.S. Joss Stone's style in the Brits completely ripped off Crystal from retro cartoon Crystal Tips and Alistair. Check it out.

Joss Stone: Click
Crystal Tips: Click.

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The Merchant of Menace

• Daniel Budden
• 14 Feb 2007 09:00

The following excerpt is taken from the play "The Merchant of Menace." In this scene our hero, Poordanio, is trading at the local bazaar.

Act II Scene III

Poordanio (Soliloquy): And I didst use a trolley rather than a basket. Tho' mine items number just five, be they a brace of chickens and three goblets of Fanta, their weighte is such that using a basket wouldst mine arms rippeth off. Thus didst I use a trolley.

Wench One: Fair Poordanio, it is time we took our items to the trader, in exchange for pieces of silver.

Poordanio: Fetch me mine pouch oh Wench, so that I may count thy silver.

Poordanio and Wench One maketh their way to thy trading counter that doth sitteth below thine inscription "Baskets Only"

Trading Witch: Thou cannot pass, this way is preserved only for thine carriers of baskets.

Poordanio: Treachery! Mine items number just five. And behold! Here cometh a basket-carrier whose items doth number many more than couldst be counted except by divine eyes.

Trading Witch begins trading with basket-carrier of infinite items. It taketh bloody ages. Poordanio, in thy most sarcastic manner, dumpeth his trolley but two paces away from thy trading counter.

Poordanio: Behold! I have returned after I didst dumpeth my trolley whereupon I stood, and didst carry in mine arms my items, numbering five, to thine trading counter that didst stand but two paces away. May I now exchange my silver pieces in return for your Free-range chicken and Fanta, pretty-please?

Poordanio taketh a sign inscribed "Next shopper please" and placeth it on ye conveyor belt, and didst plonketh down his shopping before his arms didst rippeth off.

Poordanio: Vile trading witch! Now asketh me that question that doth pass your cruel lips upon the commencement of our weekly trading exchange, the question that striketh dread into thine hearts of brave men, the very same question stole from souls of mighty winged beasts that didst drink from thy blood of Jezebel. Asketh me that question vile fiend!

Trading Witch: Possesseth you ye Clubcard?

Having picketh up one hefty goblet of Fanta, Poordanio didst striketh down thy Trading Witch. All around didst applaudeth.

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