The first ends in St Andrews

The fastest were the two weeks of revision before exams. Regardless of the course, students share this time of ‘freedom’, so the town lives from 7AM to 2AM - somebody spends half of their day buried in books, others nap under the robust trees (which Karel Čapek considered the most beautiful thing about Britain). Time of revision is a training is self-discipline, everything is on the students themselves. There are no lectures summarizing half-year of information, teachers do not pressure us to write practice tests.

However, this freedom is gone soon, what follows are two weeks of exams. My exams (three 2-hour ones, all in essay-writing format) are strangely planned, one is on Saturday, one the very last day possible. I am envious of language students, who are usually the first to finish their exams. A bittersweet distraction is ‘soaking’ - an informal farewell to graduating students, where their friends soak them in cold water and cover in glitter. The meaning of this token of friendship is ambiguous, in my opinion it washes away the unpleasant that has piled up in 3 to 5 years of study, and baptizes the new post-university life.

The end of a school year is not only exam stress and emotional departures, but also preparations for a following year. The housing in St Andrews is among the most expensive in all of Scotland. With friends we managed to find a fully equipped house in the suburbs (10 mins to town centre) for an acceptable price. The house is also opposite of the Botanic Garden which, regardless of season, beams with colours.  

Also, student societies use the end of a year to elect new committees. I am now a social events representative for Amnesty International and one of the two team captains for BALLADS, the society for ballroom dancing. We have big plans for next year, be it attending more competitions, inviting professionals from all of Britain, buying sweatshirts with university logo, or beating Cambridge and Oxford regularly, not only rarely.

Although I look forward to new school year, new house, new challenges, I am glad to be back home. I can catch up on everything I have been missing out on for the past 10 months, and in September I will return to the small historical town by the sea.