Why we should all get behind the UCL Varsity teams this year

I’m sure I’m not alone when I say the most commonly asked question about my university experience is this: “What’s it like going to university in London?” It’s always an awkward question to address because, not only is it loaded to the point you’re almost forced to comment on rent prices, it’s also all most of us have ever known.

Anybody home?

Usually, after delivering as positive a response as I can muster whilst satisfying their thirst for my despair, they press about what the worst thing is. It’s at this point I’ll usually ditch the rent bit – because it’s kind of in the background and I’ll only hate London in a few years time when I’m millions of pounds in debt – and realise the biggest problem is disunity.

Every day we walk through Malet Place avoiding eye contact with one another, cursing under our breath at the pushy flyerers on the way to sit silently in our seminars. At times, it feels like there’s no love, no community, no fun through our campus.

You’ve got no fans

Whilst our friends from Leeds live in Hyde Park, from Manchester live in Fallowfield, and from Birmingham live in Selly Oak, we’re dispersed across zones one and two. Yes, there might be a few of us in Camden, but even then the chances are we can’t ‘pop round’ for pres next door. We have smaller friendship groups (maybe I’m just a loner), we don’t have daily club nights and nobody cares about elections.

Varsity is the time that this can change. A time we should come together, be proud to go to UCL and embrace one another’s success. Nobody really hates King’s, but for eight days let’s pretend we do, let’s sing Burlington Bertie loud and proud and wear any UCL merchandise we can get our hands on.

And I’m not just talking about the rugby, let’s get to the ultimate frisbee, to the swimming, to the tennis. If you’ve got a friend in a team then try and watch and cheer on UCL to an even bigger victory than last year. Buy one of those pink and blue UCL hats and wear it with pride.

Be more like me basically

Varsity kicks off today as our hockey players take to the bright lights of the Olympic Park. Let’s start as we mean to go on with a big crowd and paint East London purple. Then let’s support the other sports this week and show Strand Poly who’s boss.

Finally, let’s go to the rugby next Friday, use it as a celebration of our success, watch the women’s match as well if you can manage the cold, and head to Piccadilly Institute with hundreds of other UCL students and feel, just for one week, part of a community.

We can all go back to hating each other afterwards.

#bleedpurple