St Andrews is cute, but there’s nothing going on there. A sentence that haunts many a St Andrews student, whether it come out the mouth of peers, parents or concerned onlookers.
When home over the summer, it was at least a bi-weekly occurrence for me to have to mount a defence of St Andrew’s size and social scene. It was a task I undertook with pride, as I genuinely believe that the minuscule nature of St Andrews is one of its major strengths. Although one could argue that I have merely deluded myself into a false sense of adoration for our teensy town, I believe going so far as to have four main streets would ruin the integrity of the cosmopolitan little community.
Stuck between the North Sea and Dundee (the most exquisitely accurate representation of being trapped between a rock and a hard place that I've come across), its students are forced to get inventive. Our unusual traditions attest to this fact. Name another university where first years drunkenly swim at 5am, and graduates are doused in alcohol upon completing their dissertations.
Credit: Louise Millar.
Rather than relying on the hubbub of a city to provide entertainment and nightlife for students, St Andreans have to make their own fun. As an only child, this is a parenting technique my mother was heavily in favour of and, consequently, a notion I am very familiar with. Perhaps the ethos of organic, creative fun is not just applicable to kids, but also to entire student bodies.
If we weren’t isolated on what is essentially a rocky outcrop overlooking the unforgiving North Sea, would there be so much originality and creativity? Would Szentek, Raisin, May Dip be a thing of the past? Would we lose our originality and plummet into obscurity as just another university in a vibrant metropolis with dozens of clubs to choose from?
Credit: Louise Millar.
Apart from supercharging imaginations, our town's pocket-sized dimensions make it easier to form friendships. We’re all familiar with the St A social dilemma – not being able to go anywhere (literally anywhere) without seeing someone you know. In first year, I quite literally once met a girl in the queue for Greggs who I remain friends with to this day. That kind of folksy interaction is one totally lost in the anonymity of a city.
So too is relying on the kindness of strangers. On May Dip, Halloween and other big nights, it’s totally standard in St Andrews to open your house up and let your peers party inside. In any other place that level of trust, compounded with the accessibility of everything, surely does not exist.
While the Bubble has its challenges, I think its merits vastly outweigh its issues – merits which would be utterly devastated by town expansion.
ความคิดเห็น