2nd Year Mathematical Physics student Haydn shares some of his experience from his time in Edinburgh, from his first semester of Year 1 to now.
“It was late on a cold October night – everyone was asleep, the usually busy streets outside were quiet and dark, and I was sat on my bedroom floor, terrified. University had only been going on for a month, but it had felt like a lot longer.
I couldn’t help but think how much fun I’d had during Freshers’ week, when everything was welcoming and warm, unfamiliar yet shiny and exciting. Every person you came across felt like a new friend, and the sheer size of the streets and shops around you made you feel like you were never alone. And, of course, there was the university itself – I’d never seen anything like it, from the old charm of Ashworth labs to the modern sparkle of the Nucleus. The possibilities were endless, and it was only just the beginning.
However, I also couldn’t help feeling that the honeymoon period of my time in Edinburgh had ended a long time ago; it was just as easy to get lost in the maze of the city centre, and many of these supposed new friends I never saw again. My studies themselves were also in full swing by then, and adjusting to such a drastic change in teaching compared to secondary school was a tough adjustment.
On top of everything, though, I missed my family, my friends, and all the quirks of my hometown that I barely even paid attention to before – I’d never spent so long away from them all, not least while on my own, and it was starting to settle in that I would need to do a lot more by myself from then on. At that moment, all I could do was lie down.
Then as surely as the sun rose the next morning, things got better. As the weeks went by, the city streets that were once a jumbled mess in my mind became no less familiar to me than the streets back home. I started to notice little things throughout my day that would seem familiar and make me feel a little more comfortable in such a big city. I started to make even more friends outside of class, yet meet up with my school friends too.
As for my family, I remembered that although I may not see them every day, they’re still always there waiting to talk to me, and that they miss me the same as I miss them. Before I knew it, Edinburgh was as much a home as the one 100 miles north of it. I realised then – and stand by it to this day – that I shouldn’t have worried about anything.
There will always be things that make life hard here, but the good parts of every day outweigh them tenfold. All I could ask for now is that any first year sitting in the dark, worried like I was, knows that things will get better than they could ever imagine. This is just the beginning, after all.”
