Saturday, September 20, 2008

The sound of conversation

All over the country for the next few days (weeks?) there will be three questions echoing around:

What A levels did you do?

Where are you from?

What course are you doing?



*sigh*

6 comments:

Reidski said...

Something very striking happens around New Cross on this weekend every single year, when you see two parents walking round with one child, said teenagers taking boxes and suitcases out of parents' cars, new faces and accents all over the place. I quite like the beginning of the term at Goldsmiths as it brings lots of new people into the area. Just what they make of it is another matter, of course.

Jane Henry said...

Ah but Lisa, you've given me a huge WALLOP of nostalgia....

Anonymous said...

My niece is just starting at Plymouth Uni, and those student house photos have already started appearing on her Facebook profile...

Ms Heathen said...

But what about the age-old question, are they getting younger with every year, or are we simply getting older?!?

Lisa Rullsenberg said...

They certainly LOOK younger - and we probably look older (to them at least).

My favourite moment usually comes when I sneak into the poster sale a couple of weeks into term to seek out cheap posters... the 'what's teacher doing here?!'

Rob said...

Durham being collegiate, when I was an undergraduate the ritual incantation went:

What's your name?
What college are you at?
What are you studying?
Where are you from?

I remember this because in Freshers' Week (at a Michael Chapman gig to be exact) I met a woman who would (some time later_) become a long-term university girlfriend. The answers went

Ann (without an 'E')
Trevs (= Trevelyan College)
French
Gomersal
......
It's near Cleckheaton
......
Near Heckmondwike!
......

By which time I was not so much nonplussed as actually minussed.

My geography of the Yorkshire Woollen District has improved since that day.