Parklife

University is supposed to be about bettering one’s self, in studying and acquiring a greater level of knowledge within a particular section of human intelligence, we hope to increase our ability to gather money and power.

Around the country government and private sponsored conglomerates of enlightenment burden school leavers with the responsibility of learning, aging lecturers resplendent in scarves and varied collections of facial hair pass on hard-won iota’s of information, piece by piece we grow towards our goals under their esteemed tuition.

Comfortable crèches for privileged young adults rise up out of the green belt, towering over naïve young bodies clad in the latest in asos street wear. Art foundation degrees rub shoulders with geology courses, their respective students boiled together within the absurd melting pot of halls.

Red-eyed late-rising liberals trudge towards theology, chino-clad grade 4 all over OTC members pace with purpose onwards to International relations, stopping not for man or beast.

Sound systems clash relentlessly, bangarang clamouring endlessly for attention noon til night like the people who downloaded it. Pantera floats under a closed door with the distinctive scent of unwashed body and panic that accompanies an engineering degree. Night owls study past the witching hour carried along by a cocktail of deep house and monster energy drink.

Money changes hands at alarming pace, exchanged with campus essentials for a few bottles of cheap red, the buyer preparing herself for a night in with the girls and an eternity of hosting dinner parties deep within the minefield of middle class life.

Two tenners thrust unceremoniously into the palm of the well dressed south Londoner everyone seems to know, in return for a malnourished portion of plant life raised underneath a light left on 24/7 in someone’s shed. The anxiety of social interaction and burgeoning workloads is staved off for another night with a combination of bong hits and overeating.

Alumni of a continuous single sex education find themselves lost without the 1950’s societal model they knew so well. Queens of home county proms and captains of the first 11 pair off with depressing regularity and grow towards their 2.4 child, suburban home destiny they consistently attempt to reject through an altered accent and sexual promiscuity.