Ah, to be a university student in Edinburgh! It’s a time when there’s a ton of events and things to do, and it’s very easy to meet people in all sorts of contexts and make forever friends. Incidentally, a good place to meet people? Free walking tours booked with us. But the reality for so many, as I remember it myself, is going into a brand new world without having much backing or guidance for what you’re doing. I’m here today to make sure you can have the best time possible as a student in Edinburgh. This will try and give you ideas if you are local, from elsewhere in the UK or an international student. The idea is to provide the sort of guidance which is neither given nor received. You might ignore it because you’re likely a teen and you know everything, but be very aware – you only know everything till the moment midnight strikes on the last day you are 19 and then you know nothing. This article is for you to remember and return to throughout your student days.
Let’s explore together.
What does an old man know about being a student in Edinburgh?
I’m now at the age where I forget how old I am all the time and have to do a wee bit of mental maths. Age is a biographical detail that stops really mattering compared to different life stages.
A 26 year old and a 42 year old struggling in the job market have way more in common than that 26 year old and a 21 year old at uni.
I was also young once and had many really old guys trying to tell me how to live life and I ignored nearly all of them. The thing is, a lot of us have had experiences similar to what you’re going to have. We have had similar problems and it all shook out for us in the end. Maybe you can learn how to shake them out a bit quicker.
It’s a great reminder anyway that most every problem can be dealt with if you give it time. Nothing is eternal and if you don’t like things now, wait a couple years, it might be worse!
First, get a lay of the land
Of course, being a website which sells walking tours the best way to understand the city is to book one with us. But this advice goes deeper than simply selling a tour.
You find yourself in a new city. This city has a lot of interesting areas and a lot of weird street patterns. Learn where you live and gain mastery of it because it’ll definitely help you in your time.
This is just generally good advice for most people in the world, but it’s especially important if you are a student in Edinburgh. This city is not like others. It is both bigger than you know and smaller than you think at the same time. It also has a castle.
There are multiple different universities in Edinburgh, 5 of them apparently. They all offer different experiences and ideas about the world. Make sure you don’t just stick to your own university crowd as university is not the time to be insular.
Societies?
One of the first thing you’ll get confronted by at university is the societies. Don’t get me wrong, these are brilliant, but I think everyone who goes signs up for more than they ever end up interacting with. You can be selective.
Then again, push yourself a little bit. I never joined anything very political when I was there because I never agreed with enough of anyone’s platform. What I’ve ended up realising is that this was a mistake because you get to meet fascinating people with very different ideas from you. You can dip your toe in different organisations without it spoiling the purity of your soul. Years down the line you may end up finding out the people you disagreed with in uni have become more similar to you than you thought. Or they’ve become equally as different but in a unique way.
Give yourself time!
See this picture above? It’s the Balmoral Hotel. It has a clock tower which is three minutes off because it used to be a train station and they figured people could use extra time to get to their train. That might sound ridiculous but this was at a time before personal timepieces were common and the fact is many people have a bad perception of time at the best times.
The train doesn’t care. It’s leaving when it’s leaving and if you’re not on it when it departs you won’t get where you want to go.
University tends to be a 4 year long process as a student in Edinburgh. It can be longer if you decide to defer for a gap year in the middle (I kind of wanted to but didn’t, was that a mistake? Maybe, but I’m happy now). It also now is basically 5 years since so many jobs seem to want a Masters.
Give yourself time for literally everything. Give yourself time to plan your essays before doing them, as they are more manageable in 7 days than 7 hours (trust me on that). Give yourself time to relax because burnout is the worse. Give yourself time to make friends and fall in love.
Give yourself time to catch the damn train on time so you don’t have to pay stupid money for a taxi from Glasgow. Or memorise where the bus station is.
Be kind to yourself
I shudder to imagine how much of my teens and early 20s I felt not really liking myself. I look back at that guy and think he was actually kind of fun, if a little much sometimes.
Anyway, this type of low self-esteem is ultimately self-defeating. You’ll go through part of your life thinking you don’t deserve nice things, or to be treated well, and you absolutely deserve to be treated well. Especially treat yourself well, students. They say Gen Z went off smoking but then went onto vaping instead. Seems like a possible error but it’s not for me to say, I smoked for years so I can hardly judge. It’s also said Gen Z used to not drink as much but have begun catching up with Millennials.
Thing is, you don’t deserve the hangovers. You don’t deserve crap guts from all the messed up food. And you absolutely don’t deserve to kick your own ass because you’re hung up on some social faux pas you made, or some lost love which has an embarrassingly tight hold on you.
The thing to remember is, you’re a student in Edinburgh. A city which feels a kind of fairytale land. There is no need to panic and be upset about things that are ultimately just the tides. Let it all wash over you.
Give yourself the time and space to appreciate where you are, learn what that is, be open to making friendships with different people, and you’ll have an amazing time as a student in this city. Just take it all in and try to actively have a good time. There aren’t that many parts of your life where you can devote yourself to discovery as much as you can right now.
The writer of this piece is quite envious of the young but also fearful of them.
Leave a Reply