The things this year’s York freshers will never appreciate

As of next month, there will be cheers of triumph and mainly tears of sadness as A Level students open their results and find out they will be moving to York. But, as their STYCs will constantly tell them during freshers’ week, and the second and third years who become reminiscent whilst being stuck in the library at 10pm, there are so many things this year’s freshers will never quite understand.

We love Willow Disco

As this year’s freshers had to learn the hard way, Willow Disco closed last summer and it is all people have been able to talk about during their emotional and hungover Courtyard dates.

Nights out just aren’t the same without Willow.

I miss the crumbly ceiling and sticking to the floor.

I miss seeing some poor sod with a slightly faded Willow stamp on his forehead at 9ams.

I miss having somewhere to go any night of the week and after any club night.

I miss the poppadoms on the bar – cheaper than buying an Oki’s.

Let’s face it, Willow was a one off – you can try to recreate it at Mansion or The Duchess but it will just never be the same. It is not the real thing if there isn’t Tommy Fong on the door outside and if you don’t see at least five different regrettable decisions to get with a Willow-munter.

Phat Fridays at The Duchess

So first we lost Willow to the disgusting Clintons manufacturer, and now Phats is moving away from The Duchess – I mean I know health and safety is a key issue and everything but don’t take away all of our shitty-chique clubs; how else am I going to test if my immune system is still on fleek?

Derwent has been rebuilt

Everyone loves to hate Derwent, in fact, one of the first pieces of wisdom any STYC passes on to their freshers: Derwent is shit. But if they continue renovating this godforsaken land as they have done all of the past year, how are we to make fun of it?

The mockery of Derwent is key to UoY life – if you can’t mock Derwent then what else can we do? Let’s rewind to when YikYak only rose to success with jokes like ‘Derwent puts the best in asbestos’ or comparing it to Mordor.

No more £2.50 trebles

The highlight of fresher’s week was going to The Stone Roses for the vital £2.50 trebles, but this can be no more as they have sky rocketed to an incredible £2.70 – inflation at its finest. No longer will a crumpled up £5 note buy you two trebles (because who wants to wait in that queue  more than once). The price for perfection meant not having to stash away any change in your pockets because the only equation necessary was that no change was needed from your £5 note – I guess now you’ll just have to spend all those 20p coins on the table football machine.

Can I have £20 cash back, please?

The second biggest issue with being in Halifax College (behind actually being in Halifax) was the lack of a cash machine – freshers will no longer have to spend money on futile purchases just in order to reach the sacred £5 minimum in order to receive cash back. It was always such a sad day when your 2 packs of Bourbons, 2 bottles of mixer and whichever hangover preparation was needed for a post-Revs Monday only came to a measly £4.99 – especially when the cashiers gave you a filthy glance for asking if you could just hand them an extra penny in order to get your cash-back. Of course, there was always that one optimist who suggested walking over to the James College cash point, but what kind of hobbit do you take me for in order to go on such a wild adventure beyond the wilderness of 22 acres.

Tron Mania

If you dared to utter the infamous four letters that were ‘T-R-O-N’ then everyone knew exactly who you meant: UoY’s Thomas Ron, aka Tron the academic officer for YUSU who graced most people’s kitchens in first year with his passionate discussion of printer credits. It’s doubtful that any other YUSU officer will be as profound as Tron has been.

Our graduation gowns are ugly just to match with where we graduate

The petition to have UoY students’ graduation in the incredible York Minster was a rife topic back in 2015, gaining a large popularity from those who felt it was the prime place for such a ceremonious day to take place. To this day however, graduation will still take place in Central Hall as it does year after year. Supposedly, the reason we cannot graduate at York Minster is because York St John graduate there as their campus is smack bang in the city centre – whereas our grey-scale-messy-clump-of-buildings that they refer to as a “campus” is in Heslington.  I mean if there was ever a fantastic reason behind something then there it is, bravo, bravo.

What even is a provost? Is that like a Royal Mail code?

York recently got rid of all provost positions – these roles have been replaced with college heads which means they will still have superior power and control, but without the fancy Latin title which makes you feel well grown up when you get to say it. But don’t fear little freshers, you’ll still have to sit through the two and a half hour talk with your respective “college head” – but don’t be surprised if you don’t get to do the Halifax “silent roar” with Oleg; oh what a blast that was.

No more tentamonia 

The giant sports tent in the James College sports centre is finally getting heating, which means there’ll be less people in the queue for Unity Health centre with the sniffles – so maybe you’ll actually get an appointment if you arrive at 8.02am. Great news for the lovely ladies of netball, the tennis and badminton teams as well as indoor hockey and basketball.

Despite the freshers not appreciating any of these major issues, let’s face it they will still have the best year and a much better time than all of the bitter second and third years. At least for their sake they won’t know any of these things have changed…until they get to day 2 of the first week when they already regret never having attended a night in Willow or Phat Fridays after having heard about their greatness from nearly every STYC and even some seminar leaders.