Why I love and hate my society

As a fresher, at the start of the year I was lost for choice of societies and sports teams to join. Half a year on, I ask myself what my sports club has done for me.

Any fresher will know that the ‘fair’ at the start of the year is pretty terrifying, but worth battling through for the free pens and food. People too enthusiastic about their society are at war against the stall next to them to get you to sign up, only for their emails to finally get moved to your spam box three weeks in.

Joining my club has to be one of the best decisions I made at university – but with every positive, there must be a negative (or several!).

As a fresher, I’m bottom of the unsaid hierarchy. There have been times on a Wednesday night where I’ve been told that I can’t speak to someone because someone else has their eye on them. Definitely talking about guys.

The cliques are also ones to be wary of. You do NOT want to be on the wrong side of them! These can be frightening as a newbie into the club, because you don’t know what is acceptable to say.

Once the year progresses, you get a more accurate portrayal of what certain people really think about others and it hits home that your team-mates may be thinking the same about you.

I found out on ‘welcome drinks’ night that just about the whole club thought I went out on Tuesday nights (massive taboo in sports club as games are played on Wednesdays) and was massively judged as a result, just because I promote for a club who happens to have a night on a Tuesday.

Yet no-one had even asked me about it. We had had several warnings that any players going out on the Tuesday would be benched for the BUCS game the next day, and these were with hindsight aimed at me!! If anyone had asked, I could’ve told them the truth straight away, that I was in bed by 10 with a belly full of carbs.

There is also a massive cost to joining a society, especially a sports club. Registration, kit, matches and fancy dress for the socials all add up but if you’re passionate about your sport, this is to be expected. The social societies vary enormously. The ‘agrics’ are by far the most outrageous in my opinion. My housemate will regularly spend upwards of £50 per social. Wow. If you’ve ever been in the same club as them, you’ll know to run and hide when ‘Country Roads’ or ‘Baywatch’ is requested. Unless your thing is to get mauled by half naked guys swinging their shirts around, then go ahead.

Although Wednesday nights are all about letting loose in Tiger, with fancy dress and copious amounts of face paint, I normally get tired of how outrageously drunk people are and head home by 2. Despite all of this though, there is something really fun with pre-ing with your team-mates and bonding off court. Isn’t one of the points of university to have fun?

As the year has gone on, I have started to understand the dynamics of the group more and realise that without them, I’d be a very bored university student. It’s nice to know people who’ve been at university longer and who study different courses.

I love my sport and even Monday morning training doesn’t put me off it because despite my shaky start, the girls I have met really do bond to become almost a family and I can’t wait to spend my next two years with them, – even if that means I’ll have to endure a few more Wednesdays at Tiger! Who knows, I may even start to like them.