A student insider guide to being a Southerner at the University of York

What to expect when you make the trek up the M1

3 months ago

| Guides

As much as we Southerners love living in York, there are inevitably some cultural clashes that cannot be avoided. You may look at York on a map before moving and see that it isn’t that far north, and think that surely there can’t be that many differences. Alas. As much as we adore our northern friends, and (hopefully) vise versa, there are some things we just don’t seem to get.

From personal experience, here is a short insider guide on what to expect when you’re a Southerner at the Uni of York.

The northern lingo and accent

Despite being aware of the many different accents in the UK, nothing prepares you for hearing the strongest Yorkshire accent you’ve ever heard in real life, for the first time. I never knew that there would be such a language barrier between people from different regions of the country.

A few times, even our Mancunian housemate’s accent was a bit too difficult for me. Be prepared to have many conversations that consist of you both saying certain words over and over again, with neither of you believing that the other actually pronounces it like that. Explaining the meaning of “mandem” and “bare peng” whilst your Yorkshire friends explain “’eee by gum” is an experience to remember. Be ready to adopt the lingo, though, as your parents back home look at you in confusion when you call everything they cook “scran”.

The weather and nature

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The temperature change from a city just a few hours away is a real, dire thing. Be ready to live in your oodie well into spring and swear by heated blankets. Preparing for the winter months feels like building up stock for an apocalypse, by second year you’ll be feeling like Ned Stark warning those from warmer areas that ‘winter is coming’.

After my Londoner friend and I decided to cut across the field to get to Aldi and proceeded to spend 20 minutes getting stuck and unstuck in the mud (affirming our status as southern city people), we agreed not to share this story with our northern countryside friends.

The food

First semester of my first year, I admit I hid an internal grimace when having some of the northern delicacies described to me. (Yorkshire puddings and The York Roast Co. are really carrying the cuisine.) Yet by now, I am proud to say that chips and gravy are a staple of my diet. The one time after a night out I ordered plain chips from Efes and my friends knew I must be unwell, was when I truly felt acclimated. When you see the price difference, any doubts about northern food are magically erased.

The geography gap

The total lack of awareness for the country we live in really comes out from time to time. Be ready to practice your ‘oh yes, I know where that is’ look when someone tells you the name of the small northern town they are from. Be ready to be made fun of by your northern friends because you can’t point out Chester on a map, whilst they say they know someone from London, only for you to tell them that that’s in Kent.

For an interesting experiment, ask your northern and southern friends to draw where the border is. Warning: telling your friend from Birmingham that they’re northern may not go down well, avoid Midlands erasure. Although, when your northern friends cling to your arm as you navigate through London with ease for them, it will be all worth it. To be forced to sit on three separate trains for over three hours just to pop back to do the washing entitles us to some degree of ignorance, surely.

Southern stereotypes

I didn’t think I fit the stereotype until my housemates expressed genuine shock at the notion that I’d never tried caviar. Be warned, people will say “rah” at you, or smirk at the way you say pronounce “bath.” Anything you say that sounds slightly posh will immediately be picked up on, leaving you assuring them, in Alfie Deyes fashion, that “I’m not a tory.” But as long as Southerners continue using the phrase, “It’s grim up north,” it’s only fair to allow it. Lots of the typical southern stereotypes don’t overlap as well as you may think, as the fact I don’t sound like Gemma Collins has become a source of conversation when I reveal I’m from Essex. And it’s true, you may miss a Pret being on every corner, but Greggs isn’t a bad replacement.

Although these cultural divides can be very funny the first weeks of Uni, at the end of the day, it is the differences between us that only bring us closer. Or at least that’s what we southerners tell ourselves, hoping that the northerners will finally accept us in this fine city.