Confessions of a Bristol fresher: A case study in poor decision-making

They say university is where you find yourself. I found myself arguing with my flatmate over who’s taking the bins out, sobbing in the ASS over a 750 word essay, and watching my friend throw up on the club dance floor.

Freshers’ year at Bristol isn’t so much a rite of passage as it is a fever dream with a UCAS code — a blur of questionable decisions, chaotic nights out, and life lessons you didn’t ask for. So, in honour of surviving (barely), here are my brutally honest confessions from a year of pesto, panic, and pounding hangovers.

The halls hallucination

Let’s start with halls, the petri dish of personalities and passive aggression. You arrive expecting wholesome flat dinners and spontaneous nights in with your new besties. What you get is six strangers with wildly different sleep schedules, a kitchen that smells like sin, and a fire alarm every time someone tries to grill toast.

In theory, shared accommodation builds character. In practice, it builds mould and mutual resentment. Our kitchen went through many phases, but the lowest was the three day period where our stovetop was entirely coated in mac and cheese.

No one knew whose it was. No one dared touch it. It became a cursed landmark — a cheesy monument to our collective apathy. Communication? Strictly through fridge post-it notes and memes in the group chat. Don’t even get me started on the bathrooms. One of my friends got an official email from accommodation services after she projectile vomited all over her shared toilet post-night out. Honestly, that may have been her rock bottom. Or her peak.

The society delusion

Most Read

The bleak aftermath of Bonnie Blue’s 1,000 guys in 12 hours challenge, in pictures

Plumber breaks silence on what his experience with Bonnie Blue was *really* like

Delta Airlines issues statement after little girl holds plane ‘hostage’ with full Moana song

Then came societies — or as I like to call it, The Great Fresher Delusion. In September, I had visions of becoming a well-rounded, high-achieving member of the Bristol student body. So naturally, I joined the A Cappella Society after binge watching Pitch Perfect (tragic), then signed up for both cricket and netball despite having the lung capacity of a 60-year-old chimney sweep thanks to my enthusiastic vape habit.

The only sport I successfully committed to was speed walking to the Triangle in heels. Did I attend a single session? No. I did, however, take home five free tote bags, a bottle opener I still use to this day, and enough flyers to wallpaper my entire flat. I’m still getting their emails, too scared to unsubscribe.

Triangle trauma

The Triangle is where dignity goes to die. There is no such thing as “just one drink” when Larocca is involved. One Wednesday, a friend of mine full body slid down the stairs of the U1 on the way to Steam, fully sober, tragically. No one helped her. We just laughed. The Triangle’s magnetic pull is stronger than my willpower. I swore off clubbing in November. By Monday, I was in The Brass Pig smoking area, telling someone I was forced to be there by my flatmate. Lies.

Then there were OMG Thursdays, the weekly tradition my friends swear they started. According to them, it was niche before they made it popular. One of them even became a minor celebrity in the club after doing the strip show, proudly claiming the title of one of the only girls brave enough to get on that stage. That night is still spoken about in our group chat like a myth and legend.

Academic Amnesia

Yes, there was technically a degree happening in the background. I had dreams of 9 am productivity and well-highlighted notes. Instead, I spent most of my time watching lecture recordings at 1.75x speed with subtitles, eating beige freezer food, and praying I could pull a 2:1 out of thin air.

At one point, I wrote a whole essay between midnight and 6am with nothing but coffee, blind panic, and my dad on speed dial to help me through the stress. Library panic hits hard. But nothing bonds you like mutual breakdowns over a group project, where one person disappears mid-way through. Still, I handed everything in, and at this point, I’m measuring success by whether I cried before or after the submission deadline.

Yet somehow, in between the hangovers, heartbreaks, and horrific pesto pasta, I managed to make it through. I didn’t learn how to budget or wake up before 10 am, but I did learn how to navigate flat politics, survive on Lidl bakery goods, and find joy in the 72 bus that took me to Frenchay four times a week to see my boyfriend.

So no, I’m not ready to be a second year. I’m still recovering from Freshers’ Week. But I am leaving first year with stories I’ll probably exaggerate for the rest of my life, and friends who were there for both my breakdowns and my benders. If nothing else, at least I now know how to find the loos in the ASS without crying. Progress.