The deadline date brought no surprises: rejections from both Leeds and Cardiff, although Cardiff did send me a lovely letter asking if I'd like to be on the waiting list as there were too many good applicants to offer everybody a place. Which was kind of nice.
Of course I firmed Southampton. I've sent in all my documents, health questionnaires and exam certificates. I've applied to Student Finance. And then last week I applied for accommodation.
The application is actually quite straight-forward: you have a series of drop-down boxes to choose from, which generally lead you to either one specific hall, or a choice of two. The Halls are spread out across the city, so choosing is a bit of a pain in the arse. I've read somewhere that 60% of students get their first preference, and of those that don't, 90% get their second preference. Which suits me fine.
Catered or non-catered?
To be honest, I'd never even considered being catered before attending the Open Day. At Southampton, this includes a breakfast and evening meal (with dessert!) Monday - Friday and brunch at the weekends and costs roughly £30 - £40 compared to self-catered students.
The main draw for me is the removal of all catering stress: no compiling shopping lists, working out when and how to get to the supermarket. No time spent cooking and cleaning or waiting for the hob to be free. No stressing that somebody else has nicked your organic, hand-grown goji berries. Just a quick trip to the dining room (you can also get your food to take-out too).
Personally, I know that I'm going to stress about the cost of food and half-starve myself in an effort to save pennies, so at least this way mother knows that I'll be eating healthily (well, twice a day, five days a week).
As a budget-savvy student I'm already determined to regularly procure a croissant or two from breakfast as a free lunch/mid-lecture snack. And there's dessert on offer each evening. Count me in.
Standard, enhanced, en-suite or premium?
This caused me the biggest headache.
Standard rooms are cheap as chips (around £75 per week) yet residents could be sharing a kitchen and bathroom with between eight and twenty others. Okay, so it's not just one toilet but even so...
Enhanced rooms, whilst slightly more expensive, have shared facilities between seven people. To be honest, this doesn't sound too bad on first reading and then I thought about it. Seven people needing to use the shower before a lecture, brush their teeth etc. Not even seven people you know (this could be literally anyone) what if it's a flat full of grubby, dirty lads? What if they make jokes about the smell of your poo? What if somebody (or me) has a particularly heavy night out and is sick everywhere? Or pees in the sink?
I did look into being enhanced, honest. I browsed through a few forum threads, weighing up the pros and cons between sharing (saves you around £30) or having an en suite. Lots of people had experiences from either side but one post in particularly cemented the deal:
"Worst I've seen is people not flushing, and some people leave the shower in a nasty state (grit, hairs, etc).
I live in a flat of 6. In 2 weeks I might have to wipe the seat of the loo or flush it for someone else maybe 2/3 times, clean a proper mess in the shower once, remove hairs that aren't my own from the plughole 2/3 times. That's a maximum of 8 unpleasant bathroom related tasks for an £80 saving. £10+ per bathroom task. I would take up a part time job cleaning other people's bathrooms if the pay was that good. "
This came directly below a post entitled 'one of my flatmates has pooed in the shower'. I do not want to flush somebody else's faeces, pick out their hairs or be forced to wear flip flops in the shower. And hell-to-the-no am I cleaning poo out of the plughole. The author of the above post might seem quite unperturbed by this bathroom mess but that makes me more suspicious of people's standards of 'hygiene'. Own shower and toilet? Yes please.
*I haven't really mentioned Premium, because I haven't really looked into it. Essentially, you get a big bed and more space. Not really worth it unless you're planning to be boshing on the regs.
The next stage tends to be the boring bits of contract length (Easter or no-Easter, I'll go home and chill, thanks), mixed or single-sex (tough one, but girls tend to do my tits in more than boys) and then choice of complex (if you even get a choice).
I think now I just wait until June, when I get my address (exciting stuff!). If I'm honest, this whole 'waiting thing' is wearing a bit thin now. There's only so much Jesters-build-up that I can take.
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