Our first highlight of 2009 "What Manchester Means" written by a fresher friend of ours describing her impression of our home city....
Words Mara Livermore
Picture James Mernagh
It means already having too much stuff to fit back into one car journey home. It means falling into lectures, into town, into a club, into bed, occasionally stopping off at important places like the bank to do grown-up type stuff.
It means food shopping. It means asking the friendly-ish-looking drinkers in the park where the best takeaway is, them pointing you towards speedy peppers & being insulted by 2nd years on the way for being a “clueless little fresher”. It means discovering over the next 3 months that speedy peppers is not the best takeaway at all, but convenient.
Manchester means discovering new music, new styles and new shops. Good when you’re having a great night out, lots of cool new outfits, & fun shopping. Bad when it’s 4am, you have to be up at 6 and your Wham obsessed flatmate (obviously the one with the biggest speakers) decides to have a rave. Bad when you get a job and still spend double what you can afford.
It means being rained on every single day. It means always catching a cold. It means trying once or twice to find an umbrella that could survive the Manchester winds, failing & learning to dance in downpours.
It means enjoying opportunities to dress up and act childishly. It means Buzz Lightyear, Tarzan and the Three Musketeers singing really loudly on the tram, and a slightly more sober Wolverine trying to convince them that although it would be cool to ride through the club doors with a tram as your trusty steed, it probably isn’t quite practical, and although flying in might seem an easy second best, if the cartoon version of Buzz couldn’t do it, the odds this fake one could were slim to none.
It means being overwhelmed by the size of the city, the busy main roads, the crowds. It means there being far too many clubs & bars, and far too many different nights on at each to do them all in one semester, but putting in a good effort anyway. It means getting lost. It means spending the first month with a map in hand. It means finding people you can enjoy being lost with, and friends who make you feel found.
Original Link: http://www.examplemag.co.uk/?p=53
09 highlights - March