11 things you’ll only understand if you lived in The Tannery

1. You may have applied for Devonshire or James Baillie towards lovely, green Headingley, but out of nowhere got placed on the other side of town with the delights of Kirkstall Road.

You could be this happy!

2. Freshers soon rolled by and that 15-minute uphill walk to Uni didn’t seem so bad. Come March you had calves like you’d mounted Everest.

3. Live anywhere but the B-block and you had to endure the wind tunnel that is the courtyard. Gale force winds at 9 in the morning? Not for me.

4. God forbid there be a fire drill. 450 students bustling to get down 10 flights of stairs to stand outside that dodgy old-man pub on a chilly Friday morning… Someone was having a cruel joke.

5. Thought you were miraculously good at pool in the first few weeks? Then one of the study-abroad guys sauntered in and whooped your ass? Yeah, me too.

Good Grief

6. You’ve spent more of your student loan in that Nisa local than you will on anything in your entire Uni life. It’s okay, it’s easier not to think about.

Consented daylight robbery?

7. When asked which halls you live at, an immediate dilemma came about: tell them and spend 5 minutes trying to explain, or lie…

You lied, didn’t you?

8. Or, in a wondrous turn of events, they do know? Your jubilation is shattered, however, as it’s revealed that they think you’re a Met student who lives at neighbouring Opal.

9. Hard day at Uni? Couldn’t help but run home because of the severe downhill (and trying to dodge the Leeds City College kids)?

Hard luck – you live on the 10th floor and the lift is out of order

10. Fancy a quiet drink at the local? Well, you have the choice of the (cut in half) old-man pub or braving the metal nights at the Fox and Newt.

11. And finally, perhaps most obviously, these never-ending stairs were the bane of your life.

These stairs alone could stop you going to uni for a week

Despite all this, the Tannery did its job, and it did it well. You may not have got exactly what you asked for, but what are the real challenges of 1^st year anyway?

Make at least one friend and get that magic 40-point pass-mark? You did/will do that, probably. So, thanks Tannery – it was all worth it!