The pinnacle of Freshers’ Week
The long-awaited pinnacle of fresher’s week had finally come – the Fresher’s Fair. After a week of talks, icebreakers, and working out how to use circuit laundry, I was finally in the queue stretching around the side of Maiden Castle, ready to find people to share my deepest interests with and develop new personality traits to talk about at formal dinners. As someone who had moved over 300 miles away from home to come to Durham, it felt very important to me to develop good friendships around me, as well as to get involved in new activities, so that Durham felt like a home away from home rather than a place of homesickness, and societies felt like the perfect place to make that happen.
So much choice
Walking into the hall, I was overwhelmed yet excited by the number of new activities to try. I had thought that my 5-minute scroll on the Student Union website beforehand was enough to navigate which societies I should make a beeline for, yet I was pleasantly surprised at how many new activities caught my eye. I took the time to chat with a range of different people, learning about themed socials, weekly activities and beginner friendly try-outs. I was happy to learn that each society had accommodations for all levels of skill, so all felt free to take part.
Attending socials
Once I got home and managed to get a list together of the 10+ societies I had seemingly signed onto the mailing list for in the whirlwind span of 20 minutes, I decided to put myself out there and see what I enjoyed by attending socials. My absolute favourites were the dressing up socials – whether it was donning a shirt like Dick Turpin for the Horrible Histories society, or coming dressed as a political figure for Politics and International Relations society, everyone took themselves less seriously when they were dressed up and it was a brilliant way to get to know people, some of whom were in the same college or course!
My top tips
Whilst I tried one of my activities with a friend, most of the time, I braved it alone and was happy to find that everyone was very welcoming and inviting. Not all activities I tried were a hit – I learned I am firmly not a mud person at the rugby taster – much of the time, I still felt proud for giving things a go.
With that, here are my top tips for navigating new societies:
- Talk with as many people as possible – you may have some idea of what you want to do already, but you never know what you might discover!
- Don’t feel pressured to do everything at once – many societies are always open to accepting members in the middle of the year, so make sure you take a breather!
- After freshers fair, follow your favourite societies on Instagram to stay up to date with all their activities.
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