Why does everyone love Murano

It’s a shitehole


Murano Street Student Village: a hub of activity, a hive of excitement and an absolute shit tip. 

Murano is literally the worst place most of us will ever live.

Don’t get me wrong – the place is legendary. Chad Hogan has never seen anything like it.

Amazing parties and pre-drinks that QM could only dream of, never mind the graveyard that is Firhill.

But it’s also a disgusting amalgamation of dirt, rubbish, alcohol and the stench of unadultered freedom.

Myself and Murano at our finest

The bedrooms

No matter if you’re in a small or large Murano flat the size of your room doesn’t vary greatly, unless you’re one of the corner rooms in which case you’re a pig in shit.

It’s a hovel.

The rooms resemble what can only be described as a jail cell with a metal frame holding a mattress that doesn’t quite constitute a real bed.

It’s basically a glorified blow up bed, but a blow up bed is sturdier.

Oh, and they’ve nailed a plank of wood to the wall behind the bed to make it look like a headboard. Very clever.

Barely room for two

The desk and wardrobe aren’t too bad made from light coloured wood and smelling just like the fresher who lived there before you. Delightful.

The carpet, scratchy and rough underfoot, is just dark enough to cover any previous stains but light enough that there are still vague traces of suspicious spillages.

These rooms are an absolute travesty for anyone who pitches up on moving day and realises they have to live in there for seven months.

The streets are flooded on moving day with the tears of naive freshers.

There have been reports of Freshers running after their parents’ cars screaming. But that’s just speculation.

The flat 

The kitchen is the social hub of the flat as Murano weren’t thoughful enough to give us all living rooms, cheers Sanctuary. Might also be due to the fact it was built on the blueprints of a women’s prison.

Think Cornton Vale but with an added dose of white collar chic.

The drafty linoleum covered space is even worse than the bedrooms and that weird smell just never seems to go away. Ever.

A mix between desperation and mouldy pasta is never what you want to smell in the morning when you’re making your porridge.

Absolutely foul

Since we don’t have living rooms the most obvious solution is to cosy up in a bedroom. But often it means about 5 people are sitting on the camp ‘bed’ and so moving is always an issue in case of collapse.

Makes watching a movie a balancing game

Small flats are given one toilet and two shower rooms but they’re all separate which makes a morning shit and shower a bit of a chore. So, basic human rights are impacted in Murano.

The rooms of murano couldn’t be much worse really, unless of course, the heating didn’t work. Oh wait, it didn’t.

The absolute fury induced by the state of these rooms throughout the year is comparable to that little shit in Lord of the Flies.

Location

Murano is located in what some may call a ‘rough’ area of the West End; Maryhill.

Robberies were rife

Maryhill is an example of what the world will look like after a nuclear bomb.

It’s run down, and shit looking and you can’t go for a run past 5 in the evening without taking a rape whistle.

To be honest, despite all the things wrong with Murano I never considered location a massive issue, not compared to the lack of heating and absolute cave of a bedroom.

That’s until the long and frankly, gravity defying walk back from Uni if you miss the SRC bus.

It’s the kind of walk that eats away at your soul and makes you re-evaluate everything you’ve ever been told. By the end of the journey you can’t remember your middle name.

The Murano hill climb and the Murano steps challenge are a feat rivaled only by the likes of Ben Nevis. Not once did  I return to my flat without looking like I’d been licked full in the face by a friendly cow.

MSSV in all its glory

Maryhill is famous for being the area of Glasgow in which Taggart was filmed and so there was always the worry that fat detective bloke was going to turn up at your door declaring: “There’s been a murder.”

‘Rape Alley’ and ‘Rape Wood’ were the only two ways of travelling to Uni by foot which made late night library sessions a bit of a dodge or die situation on the way home.

The police and Fire Brigade were within 2 mins, because Maryhill is so accident prone they based two branches of emergency services there, just in case.

If your flatmate got her iPhone stolen in the viper toilets or someone in the flat below set their Pop-Tarts on fire again, it was quite useful.

But no one wants to hear the sound of a fire alarm at 7.30am. Absolute wankers.

Flatmates

Being in a small flat with only three strangers is a tough gig. And by tough gig I mean a fate worse than being tortured by a feather duster in a garden full of angry anacondas.

You’re forced together to live in the burning wreck that is Murano. It’s like Lost when the plane crashes and everyone forgets who they are and they start killing each other.

Yeah, but not as tame.

luxurious right?

A small flat seemed like a sweet deal – less people, so it’ll be tidier and we’ll have a closer relationship, I thought to myself. Seemed like a good idea. Good idea, my arse.

Stalin had better ideas than that.

One of them ignores me in the street on a regular basis.

I can’t remember what the other one looks like.

And the last one I only see pop up every few months.

At least in a large flat you’ve got the option of 10 other people to be friends with. I had three and not one of them was good enough to share my spaghetti with.

All dry foods were kept in my room along with extra toilet roll and my dignity.

Can’t be too careful

No one else felt the need to buy it (toilet roll, not my dignity) and I definitely didn’t want to get caught short in the coffin that was our only toilet.

Being buried alive would be better than spending longer than two minutes in that cupboard with a sink.

The upside

Murano or Murizzle as it is fondly known by some (not me), had its downsides. But even though it pains me to say it, there was one good thing about it.

The block system made it easy to nip downstairs or upstairs whenever you want.

Campaign office

And honestly it was so shit it banded me and my mates together faster than a troop of marines knee deep in a war zone.

You think that’s an analogy but the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder disagrees with you.

Chad Hogan aint got nothin’