Second Year? Completed It Mate.

The fact that it was a whole year ago I was sat in my teeny little dorm room writing a post about my experience as a first-year uni student is baffling. I don't even want to think about how soon I will be writing a post about waving goodbye to uni for good and setting sail for the big wide world. I'm not ready for that yet - I only learned how to iron things properly yesterday. 

And yet, here we are. It's a gorgeously sunny day here in Southampton, but in traditional Ellie fashion, I'm locked up in my room with some Disney tunes to keep me company, tapping away at my keyboard. But what else is there to do? I always find it so strange finishing an academic year and having nothing to do. I can lounge around drinking copious amounts of tea and watching copious amounts of YouTube without the lingering feeling I should probably be doing work. And with nothing else to do, what better time to reminisce about my time as a Level 5 Multimedia Journalism student, and close the book on second year?

^In last year's post I showed off my favourite ice cream parlour in Southampton, and now I introduce to you, the one and only Stakks pancake house. You're welcome for this tip.^ 

My experience as a first year and as a second year have been pretty different, and that started from the moment I came back to Southampton. It was adios to my echoy, smelly flat in halls and bonjour to my less echoy - but still smelly - house. I now live in a student house not far from uni with 3 other boys and Emma, who, if you've been here before, you should know of by now (thank you for taking these pictures btw Emma!!). For me, living in a house has been a whole new kettle of fish. I love the space and I do feel more grown up and independent, but when you're in such an environment with people you see day in, day out - we can all rub each other the wrong way sometimes. I know I'm guilty of doing things that will get on the nerves of my house mates, and I'm sure they know they do the same. But when you have the responsibility to keeping a household together without the cleaners halls had, it's not hard to get stressed. Having said that, we have got on better than other house mates, and the place hasn't fallen down yet so that's a plus. Tips for people moving into their shared student houses next year - try and balance out the chores as much as you can so no one is left to doing it all (we have a weekly rota for who does what), and try and cook or have sit down meals with your house mates; after hard days at uni, having that time in the evening to chill with your friends is important. 

And that leads us beautifully into the next topic of conversation: friends. In first year, you're thrown in at the deep end and you try and make as many friends as possible. Although in second year, now that you're more settled and relaxed in your friendship groups, you may find these friendships shift. From my personal experience, second year is when you find your true friends. Last year my course was very tight-knit and we did so many things together, and I still do spend the majority of my time with a lot of those people - just not all of them. And you know what? That's okay. You don't have to be friends with everybody! I've found that second year is much more about getting your head down and actually doing work rather than hitting up Oceana every other night, and especially in those times when you need help with work or your feeling stressed and down, that's when your true friends really pull through. I'm so lucky to have the people I do around me. 

Let's move onto the the thing I mostly came to uni for: the course itself. A little refresher - I'm at Solent University in Southampton doing Multimedia Journalism. First year was about getting to grips with the stuff. Second year is about putting that stuff into practice. I've absolutely loved the units this year and been so proud of some of the things I've managed to produce. From full news packages, to a portfolio of articles written for publications I'd love to work for, to a whole sustainable lifestyle magazine made alongside some fabby course mates - I've managed to churn out a lot. While the pressure has certainly been turned up a notch this year, it's such a great feeling to actually enjoy the work I do, and has confirms to me all the more that this is the field of work I want to pursue. 

Something I spoke about in my post last year was my constant desire to go home. There are times when I didn't enjoy uni at all and I felt very distant from not only my friends and family back home, but even the people at uni. I think there are always going to be times when I want to be surrounded by my family, or times when I'm missing being tucked up in my bed at home with a steaming cup of tea in my giant Sirius Black mug. And that's okay. It's normal. As the old saying goes, 'home is where the heart is', and I think I discovered when I was back home for Easter that when I'm there, I feel like I've escaped my Southampton problems. Something I've also learned this year is that if there is something making you unhappy, the solution isn't to ignore it and wait for it to go away. Be it a person, a piece of work, whatever - I've found the best way for me to tackle that is head on. Finding the strength to be the bigger person, ditching that negativity or toxicity, and coming out of a situation on top gives me that little boost of confidence I need to think, yeah, I can do this, I can ask my friends for help if I want, but most importantly - I can do it myself. Getting to that stage can be hard, so I'll repeat what I said last year, word for word: Talk to someone; whether it's a friend or someone who works at the uni, because chances are, experienced people at the uni have probably dealt with similar situations before and can really help you out, or that friend - whether they're feeling the same way or not - makes for a fantastic shoulder to cry on. The point still stands. 

On that note, what's next? Well, third year means final major project, which means the nerves are well and truly kicking in. In the next few weeks I'm going to sit down and have a good think about the kind of thing I'd like to do for the project, but for now - I think I'll help myself to another custard cream and relax a little. As for the summer, it's back to work for me, as well as what promises to be a family holiday to remember and spending lots of time with my favourite people back home.