Hello from Manchester, first of all. Yes, I have arrived back in Blighty after 9 years for university. Salford is my new home, as small as it appears to be, but that doesn’t mean that it hasn’t got it’s own personality. Oh no, in fact I believe I am living in one of the most unsafe areas in the whole of the Greater Manchester area, which I find quite ironic seeing as there didn’t appear to be anything going on in Voorschoten or Wassenaar. So yes, I appear to have been thrown into the deep-end of the murky, fetid pool of troubled crime-ridden towns. It says a lot when literally the first night me and my flat mates ventured out we were approached and threatened by a (albeit drunk) fellow who claimed to own a 10 inch blade with which he would do some serious damage to us. Thankfully he was too drunk to see stand upright without help and only followed us a couple of metres, but it was a frightening experience regardless.
I suppose having a police station right next door to the student flats I’m living in can be regarded as nothing but a bonus, but it also has it’s downsides; namely the sirens going off every two bloody minutes. I heard the first siren of the day at around 8am, and it pretty much continues all hours. I hope those coppers are getting a good pay package at the end of the month, because they certainly have their work cut out. Probably with good reason as well, because a lot of things seem to go on around here. The shops shut at 5, which I’m told is ridiculously early for shops in the UK (but is normal in Holland), the only bars in the area are university owned ones, and at night there is literally nobody about, even on the campuses. It’s actually quite eerie, because of a day time the streets will be full of students and other people. Then again, this is the place where two nights ago I heard a couple of gunshots and a ton of police sirens went off not long after, so I guess I can see the point there.
The problem is that the student life around here appears to have suffered. Fresher’s Week, which is for most universities a big deal with loads of parties and heavy drinking, is limited to two activities fairs. Yes that’s right, two fairs, and not of the cotton candy and ferris wheel kind. That appears to be the only university organised student get-together around here. I’ll be honest, I’m kind of grateful for the lack of organised piss-ups here anyway, because it means no Fresher’s Ball and therefore no feelings of absolute wretchedness, because I know about 4 people in the entire university and even then it feels enforced because 2 are my flatmates are 2 are on my course, so we kind of HAVE to get along even though they are all nice people. Anyway, the one “party” that was thrown in my halls was a complete joke, consisting of a bunch of people crowded around in a small room with 90s pop music provided from a overhead projector with the only available drinks and snacks being coke and crisps. I didn’t stay long, because frankly it was a bit pathetic. The student Union-owned and run bar and club in the area are not only difficult to get to but are also a bit of a disappointment in the long run as well; the bar was, although reasonably priced and relatively quiet and relaxed when we went (on a Sunday, mind you), was also rather soulless; it had nothing that really made it special and was really the kind of place that you’d find in a Beefeater pub or something generic like that. It was better than the Union club we went to last night, though, which gave off the kind of vibes that after 12:30 you were almost expected to be rat-arsed and looking for someone to shag for the night, otherwise you would have failed to have a good time. It was full of those sorts of girls that wear what could be loosely described as very short dresses but actually resemble bits of sewn together rags, with stupidly high heels and hair that smells burnt a mile off, and guys who in any social situation involving said girls and alcohol lower their voices several octaves and address everyone as “mate”. Again, not the kind of place me and my flatmates were looking for. It seems as if the university is almost protecting students from something terrible, as if any bars or pubs not barred from public entry and with some sort of identity would immediately be ram raided by the locals.
We ended up going into Manchester, which was only a pound on the bus, and had a perfectly reasonable time in the bars, but again, the clubs were lacking in sensible people and were more designed for the kinds of guys who wear V necked t-shirts and wear skinny jeans like they’re actually a good thing. We got handed a leaflet each for some sort of Freshers’ pub crawl, with the names of various bars and clubs around the shopping centre we were in marked out with boxes you had to tick once you’d been there. I have no idea how long you were supposed to spend in each place, because from memory there was only about 5 of them and the time limit was from 8 til 10. We arrived at 9, so we couldn’t have had a pint in each if we had wanted to. The problem was that even that felt enforced; the leaflet claimed that it didn’t matter in which order we went around, so we walked around a bit deciding where to go first. However, the entire area was blocked off with the people organising the crawl, and when we approached the 4th club on the list to go in, we got shouted at by one of the staff telling us to “start at the top of the list”. Zeig heil.
Instead we stuck two fingers up at the Fascist Fun Brigade and went home for some cider. I guess the British need to get trashed and flash your knickers by 10 o’clock at night will not be one of those traits I indulge in. I however refuse to believe that those clubs and bars is all that Manchester has to offer, and I aim to find a place that I love just as much as my old haunt in Den Haag.
My laundry is done.
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