When I'm on workterm, many of my co-workers can't remember what living like a student was like (for those who went to uni), or never knew what living like a student is like (for those who didn't). I'm writing this page up for two reasons: 1. To give helpful warnings^H^H^H^Hadvice for prospective students, and 2. To further educate those who don't know what we students have to live like.
Staying Dry
So you've just found out that you're going to be going to university and living away from home for the first time, what is the first thing you're going to do after getting drunk at a friend's house and causing all sorts of beligerence? Answer: Loot your house for useful items such as screwdrivers, pillowcases, a REALLY BIG coffee mug, and a walkman. In fact, these items are all a bare-bones (literally) student needs to graduate through most Canadian universities.
Housing is a nice thing to have by the time you arrive on campus, so plan early! Living in residence is usually expensive, and the beds are usually worse than sleeping on two unfolded cardboard boxes. Renting a room off-campus is usually a better option (unless you like to par-tay, in which case the 1st-year residence is definitely boom-bastic). If you can, beg/plead/steal money off your parents so you can travel to your university town a few months ahead so you can see the room you're renting before you have to move in. If you're a cheap bastard like me, you can get a list of places to live from the University off-campus housing list (almost all universities have one), and get a room in a house without ever visitting the house (this may not be the best method, unless you like cockroaches as pets). If you're an ultra-cheap bastard and don't want to pay for long-distance charges, you can just arrive on campus and find a place to live the same day (good luck!). There are also a few uber-cheapskates who don't even bother finding a place to live; they just sleep in the public student lounge (for *real* student life, this is the way to go)!
Grindage
Now that you have a place to live (or at least keep your stuff dry), you can worry about sustainance. A clean water supply is the number one proprity before any serious cooking can happen. There are numerous places to find water on or around campus, but unfortunately only a few of them are clean enough to drink. Locations to avoid getting water from: Ponds, toilets, drainage ditches, water fountains, anywhere it's free. Now that we've eliminated all the prime spots that students would look to find water, we can discuss the places where a student can get water cheaply. Go to a restaurant and bring a few empty bottles, usually restaurants will fill glasses with ice-water as they hand out menus; take this opportunity to drink as much life-liquid as possible, and pour the remainder into a bottle. For more water, just claim that more people will be arriving soon, and the waiter will fill more glasses. When the pressure to make an order gets too much, explain that you have a family emergency and need to be getting home right away. Then run. Other places to get water include faculty lounges and neighbours' garden hoses.
Food is usually another requirement for eating. It can easily be purchased at your friendly neighbourhood grocery store. That is, it can easily be purchased if you have money and are a fool. Any *real* student knows how to acquire food for free. Places to look include conferences, lectures, and other peoples' fridges.
Now that we have an ample supply of clean water and food, we can do some actual cooking! Put the water in a pot, add some food, and boil. The amount of time needed to cook the food depends on what kind it is. A guideline would be to boil until it starts falling apart.
Distractions
Shelter, food, what else does every student need? How about distractions to keep the mind off class? There are many sources of entertainment that a student has at his or her disposal. Among the most popular are the following (in no particular order): Alcohol, nookie, euchre, road trips, and the ubiquitous "hanging out". Each has their particular advantages and disadvantages. Some may be expensive (such as nookie), while others can easily be done on the cheap (such as nookie).
Most of the fore-mentioned activities are pretty instinctive and need no instructions from me (ask a friend if desperate). And so instead I shall mention a few less-known-but-still-entertaining games to prevent one's mind from being overrun by important things like schoolwork. One incredibly fun pastime is "Lecturehall Chicken". The way you play is by doing the following:
- Get a bunch of friends (enemies?) together in a large lecture hall which has a ramp going the length of the aisle.
- Start at the top of the ramp and roll down the length on a bike/skateboard/rollerblades/etc. without using any brakes.
- The person who bails closest to the blackboard, or makes the largest smear on the blackboard wins.
- For extra fun, instead of using a lecture hall that has a ramp, find one that has a set of stairs!
Another exciting game is that of "Urban Bike Derby". Calculate the longest path of tunnels interconnecting the campus' buildings. Get a bunch of friends (enemies to make it more exciting?) and start at one end of the path. Begin biking through the buildings on the designated racing path until you reach the finish line. Extra points can be gathered by running over 1st years. Try and make the course go through several different floors, so an element of "offroad" biking is experienced as the participants try to cycle up stairs. With experience, opening fire doors in long hallways can be done without having to get off the bike. Just be on the watch for campus police, as they may be under the delusion that travelling 50kph through the Physics building is dangerous (but remember that you're on bike and they're on foot, so guess who'll win the chase?).
Study Habits
Ask many students, and they will certainly agree that studying is a habit. A bad habit. Many students fall under the delusion that studying hard will pay off. The deluded fools' rationale is this: Studying hard makes you remember information. Remembering information allows you to do good on tests. Doing good on tests gets you good grades. Now using a simple trick of logic, you cannot guarantee that the converse is true: Getting good grades means you studied hard. Therefore, there must be an alternate method of getting good grades. Indeed, there are many. Here are a few of my favourites:
- The Coast
- Suck Up
Anyone familiar with "The Coast" will agree it is the easiest method of getting straight As. It also has the bonus of not making you a target for assassins hired by your classmates to take you out (as the "Suck Up" method tends to do). First step is to become the protege of someone else who used the Coast. That person will become an invaluable asset to you. Using your Master Coaster, you can find out which professors tend to hand out the same assignments and exams from year to year. Armed with this information, choosing classes becomes a no-brainer.
Sucking up to the professor is a much under-utilized tool. While it makes you look like a total goofball, it is very effective. There is a (abridged) set of Dos and Don'ts for ass-smooching:
| Do | Don't |
| Arrive to class early | Camp out all night in your favourite seat |
| Talk to the professor, and ask interesting questions | Say dumb things |
| Explain that you have a learning disability and require assistance outside of class (gets 'em every time) | Be a stalker |
| Pretend to be emotionally distraught when you fail an assignment; bring on the tears. | Do it in front of the class. |
Finances
Upon arriving on campus, students need a place to keep their money. Most students set up an account with a local bank. Some use a bank that is located on-campus so they minimize the distance they need to travel to do all their banking. However, there is an alternative to using a bank and it has no service charges! The student library is a grossly under-used cash-storing device.
The library is the safest place in the world to lose a wallet. Librarians are known around as the most trustworthy (and introverted) people all around the world. As such, it is very easy to "lose" your wallet (which contains your life savings) at the library check-out, return a week later, and not even a penny has been taken out. Whenever you need to make a withdrawl, just pop around and reclaim your lost posession. To make a deposit, just throw it over the check-out counter when the librarian isn't looking.
Loans a bit trickier than savings. The first step is to create connections in the rare book black-market. Once you have a fence, you are ready to take books out of the library and sell them for cash. After some time, you will quickly realize that the late charges accumulated are much, MUCH smaller than the interest you would collect on an equivalent loan at a bank. To pay back the loan, just buy the book from a used bookstore and pay the late fees.
"So what?", you may be asking yourself, "I can do all these things at my bank! Why would I need a library?" There are several reasons why a library is better than a bank. The first is that there are no service charges at libraries. Banks have monthly account plan fees which are taken from your account balance, libraries have no such fees. Libraries have shorter line-ups than banks do, especially around student loan time. The last reason is that libraries have longer hours than banks.
Social Life
I don't have a social life, so everything in this section is based purely on word-of-mouth. There are three things everybody needs to have a social life:
- Beer
- Beer
- Beer
Once you have these things, you're set.
That is all.
Gratuitous Nudity
I am going to assume a certain level of proficiency in carnal acts. If you find something in this section that you don't understand, either find a book as a reference (dictionary, National Geographic, Playboy, etc.), ask a friend, or just return to your little hole and never come out.
There are many places on campus where nookie may take place:
- Lecture halls at night on the weekends
- Student lounges at any time of day
- Cafeterias (but not on the food before it's served)
- Back row during class
- The roof of the library
- *IN* the library (kinda hard to keep quiet in those study booths, though)
To many people, the actual act is not the difficult part. It is in the finding of a horizontal mamba partner where the difficulty lays. My advice: Get out more, see the world, and go to student pubs after last call. While this may not be the best way to get a quality S.O. for a large quantity of time, it is an easy (read: cheap) method.
Email me: kinthelt@gmail.com
