Missing the SU? Here is the journey of a night out in Cardiff

I’m going to get brutally honest for a second: since clapping for the NHS finished, I can no longer differentiate between the days of week. My daily workout consists of walking to and from the fridge, and it is a rare occasion that I get up before midday. It’s been too many days since the last SU night, and I’m starting to believe it was all a VK-induced fantasy.

Did we really queue in the rain, drunk out of our minds, dressed as babies or as a character from Super Mario Brothers? Did we really use to run from pub to pub, drinking and vomiting on repeat, struggling to get as much alcohol in our systems as possible? Where is this foreign life I once lived?

So now, as I sit at home longing for the days where my flatmates had to drag me on a night out, I’ve come to realise that the best nights out are the spontaneous ones.

The whole thing is always last minute

It all begins when you’ve sat down for dinner and a cuppa with the flat, and someone slyly suggests ‘should we go out?’. Everyone pauses for a moment, torn between their desire to get absolutely smashed and their reluctance to get ready. How do we come to a decision? The answer is simple: we do a coin toss. That’s right, a coin toss. A completely logical way to make decisions. And before you know it, you’re in the shower downing straight tequila whilst shampooing your hair. You know, so you can get drunk as quickly as possible.

Pre-drinks are stressful AF

As you’re applying makeup (or whatever it is you lads do) and wrapping your head around the fact that you’ve fully committed to a night out, someone from the kitchen yells those five precious words. The five words every student longs to hear…UBER IS ONE MINUTE AWAY!

Now commences the mad scramble out the flat.  You’re grabbing all the tinnies you can find and before you know it you’re running through Taly in the rain, downing three drinks at once and silently cursing the Uber driver for not letting you drink in the car. Never have I felt classier than downing an Aldi’s own G&T tinnie on the curb in front of Taly reception.

You’re probs already thinking about your bed

So, you’ve now made it. You’re outside the SU, drenched through, sobering up and asking anyone who will listen if they’ve got a spare ciggie you could nick.  The only thing that keeps you going, the light at the end of the hazy tunnel, is knowing that you’re one step closer to garlic mayo chips from Fattoush.

You start calculating what the acceptable time is to leave as you hand the security guard your ID to get in. You start questioning your ability to pull a Cinderella and leave at midnight. True, you will have only been there for an hour, but at least you went? As soon as you realise you need to wee, it’s game over. Better to walk home in the rain than being smothered in the queue for the girls’ loos.

Your friends start to disappear

As the night progresses, one by one your mates start to disappear. Have they gone to the loo, off on the pull, or stumbled solo to the smoking area? The betrayal dawns on you as you stand alone in the middle of the dance floor, sandwiched between rugby corner, netball pillar and the football lads. You look around and decide there is no way to spot them from the dancefloor (especially when you’re like me and at least a foot shorter than everyone around you).

You go upstairs to try and find your mates in the sea of people down below

Now this is a battle from the get go. You shoulder your way to the stairs, trying not to spill all the drinks you’re holding (your mates VKs as well as your own). Once on the stairs the sheer strength required to put one foot in front of the other without toppling over is a skill most drunk people do not possess. You slip and slide up the stairs until you reach the balcony overlooking the dancefloor. A vantage point from which you’ll surely be able to see your mates from, right? Wrong!

With everyone crammed together like sardines you can only distinguish between costumes, not people. At this point you’re so drunk you can’t remember what your friends were wearing, or if they’re even still in the SU. Screw this you think, and you down all the drinks you’re holding before stumbling towards the nearest exit in the vague direction of food.

The only reason you came out in the first place: food

You’re walking back, no longer resisting the urge to drunk-text your ex as your mates aren’t around to stop you. Before hitting send you glance up to make sure you haven’t wandered into Bute Park, and you spot it. An oasis in the midst of a grey Colum Road: Fattoush. At the touch of a takeaway box the night becomes worthwhile as you sit on the curb relishing those sacred garlic mayo chips.

Maybe this ‘night out’ thing isn’t so bad after all.

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