Everything you’re going to miss in Liverpool when you graduate
We’ll meet again…
Liverpool will always be your second home and you’ll forever have fond memories of your time here, but now after three years, you’ve maxed out your overdraft and the time has come for you to move on to that graduate job or back to your parents’ house. It’s officially time to go.
Cheap pints
A priority on any student’s list of potential university choices is, of course, the price of booze. Whether it’s £1.25 pints at the Brookie to the huge variety of Irish “old man” pubs in town, you’re never a few steps away from a cheap bev. When you eventually move down to London for a job you hate or back to the Home Counties to have a quiet one in local village pub with your family, you’ll be eyeing up cheap train tickets to get your ass back up here and down as many pints as possible.
Abercromby Square
The only place to go when it gets sunny for 20 minutes on your lunch break/you need a backdrop for your dissertation hand in pic. You’ll miss the mix of people who sit here in all weathers, and you’ll certainly miss all the Instagram likes that come flowing in whenever you take a photo of this stunning view.
Scousers
Taxi drivers, bar staff, shop workers, buskers…the list goes on. You cannot deny that scousers are the friendliest people in the north. They’ll be the first to tell you about the Wirral-Liverpool divide and how to quickly get to the docks by avoiding the traffic. Liverpudlians are fantastic, and you’ll miss each and every one of them.
The SJ
You may have spent every day there for the past six months, but let’s be honest, you’ll miss it. Between the fire alarms and the frequent fag breaks outside, the Sydney Jones was your spiritual home. Eduroam may have been consistently problematic, but bitching about what Sarah got up to over Easter on your walk to the water fountain always kept any potential breakdowns at bay.
The 699
We may never know why it is called the 699 but we will always remember shouting “What do we think of Greenbank? SHIT!” on the way to the Raz every week.
Carnatic
Be it cooked breakfasts straight after a night out to 4/20 on Carnatic lawn, or even simply living only one door away from a flat party every night, Carnatic was the only place to be a fresher in Liverpool. Living on Smithdown afterwards just never cut it, and all you’ve ever wanted since is to be preing in Salisbury before getting the bus into town.
Smithdown
Every day you wondered why there were SO MANY weird shops on your walk to uni and every day you promised yourself you would only “pop in” to that house party on Langdale. But every day you still disappointed yourself in not working out why people actually went to them, and disappointed yourself in still staying at that party until 6am. It’s shit, but we adore how shit it is. Smithdown is always the beginning and the end to each uni story you tell, and you will miss living with your best friends and being two minutes from an ALDI and a party all at once.
Lambananas on every street corner
And it’s a scouse tradition to get a photo on one every night out.
Concert Square
Because where else would you be able to get a cheap cocktail, smoke shisha and nip in and out of clubs all night? AND THEY’RE ALL FREE ENTRY. The dream.
The man who busks with a toy microphone in L1
Because he’s ICONIC
Endless society drama
Whether it’s the banning of the Medic Society by the University to the Netball team’s questionable choice of fancy dress, UoL has provided enough gossip to keep Perez Hilton on his toes. You’ll miss walking into every seminar and hearing the phrase ‘Oh my god you never guess what I heard happened at AU…’
Albert Docks
An actual UNESCO Heritage site, the Albert Docks are beautiful, classy and #classicliverpool. With fascinating museums like the International Slavery Museum next to modern art galleries like the Tate and Open Eye, the Docks satisfies all intellectual desires. But the bars are what the students will miss, obviously. The posh restaurants are fab but where else can you be toasting some gorgeous cocktails whilst looking out on to the Mersey whilst simultaneously getting involved in a conga competition.
That Blue plaque in the guild
Because Liverpool is so extra and you couldn’t be more proud.
Baltic Triangle
The home of Bongo’s Bingo, Chibuku, 24 Kitchen Street AND Constellations, the Baltic Triangle is the most diverse area of Liverpool’s cultural scene. With some of the coolest coffee shops, bars, start-up businesses and a different event on every night, you will never be bored when passing through. You will certainly miss walking back to smithdown with a bottle of water in your hand, but you won’t, however, miss endless threats of club closures and gentrification. Let’s be honest, trips back up here to visit your mates doing masters will be co-ordinated around attending an event in the Baltic Triangle.
Sefton Park
Whether you’ve been to an event at the Palm House or just had a picnic in the sun, the memories you have of Sefton Park will stay with you forever. Oh, and that sun burn you also got when you got too day drunk to remember to put on sun cream.
The Tesco by the SJ
It’s just so convenient. We wrote a whole article about it, we love it that much.
Level’s celeb filled Friday nights
You’ll tell yourself you’d never go to see Gaz from Geordie Shore and you don’t care about Alex from Love Island, but you will certainly be kicking yourself if you miss the Cheeky Girls. In reality, you’d be going to all three and pay stupid money to take a photo with these D-List celebs. But hey, you’ll definitely miss those trashy nights on £2.50 doubles.
How left-wing everyone is
We all know that one person who came to uni as that Tory loving, David Cameron-obsessed person who is now leaving as a Corbyn-leaning, nose-ring wearing vegetarian. Liverpool just has that effect on you; we may not call each other ‘comrade’ on the daily, but we can be regularly found at an anti-EDL rally or canvassing for our local Labour MPs. Liverpool is a left-wing haven, and your home town will 100% have voted Theresa May – just saying.
Bumping into everyone you know in the Raz
The Raz is an institution. The crying step is second-to-none as the best part of the night out. But nothing ever beats jamming to Shania Twain and bumping into everyone on your course and everyone from your halls. Yes, it’s not as busy as it used to be. No, it’s not as good as it was in first year. But you can’t deny how much fun you used to have there in first year and crave being back. Whilst you’re slumming it in your boring 9-5 job and realise you can’t go out on a Monday ever again, you’ll be wishing you’d be necking raz bombs and getting off with strangers all over again. Love live the Raz.
Not seeing ‘The Sun’ being sold anywhere
That sentence never gets old. #JFT96
The Tab Liverpool
Obviously. This is a no brainer, we all know you search through clubbers of the week on the reg to see if you spot Caroline necking on with that lad in Juicy.