Taking The Plunge

Most students that come to Rhodes University for the first time generally are fresh out of school. Basically they will forth go their first prolonged trip that they will undertake, away from the confines of their beloved parentals that have nurtured them from that most joyous time in their life when they were born. That scary good-bye when the parents drive away on what seems an endless road and then they are gone you could not think of a brighter day because this is the step into your future. This step is the one which your parents have no control over, they are not watching anymore and it is time to spread our wings into a path of unknown.

There is one slight problem when rolling onto your two feet into the unknown, which is you do not know where to step first. Going with the flow seems the first option and you start thriving on that point, the first step normally leads you to party because you have no limits now on what to do and by this point you let loose and go crazy. It all starts with that one little taste of pure ecstasy that is going out and then you are hooked, some seem to fight the addiction but some fail miserably. This addiction comes with the fact that university in first year is blow off and we are here to have the time of our lives and not everything is about work. This is where people start to lack in their work, which for most during the old school days we were on tip top shape when it came to keeping up to day and not leaving anything to the last moment. Then comes the whole down fall of being a night fiend in the local pub when you spend a full night scheming across the key board to try and finish a assignment for the ten o’clock due time, the result no sleep. The conclusion, well you are obliged to go to lectures so you stumble into the theatre, enter the back row where you may be oblivious to the droning lecturer who is blabbering on in gibberish, then in moment notice your eyes give in and counting sheep becomes your next activity. The lack of sleep is the price to pay but there is no care in the act, you are a first year and at that moment you are having all you need to do is pass and there is nothing more to it.

So with all the antics that a student in first year it seems the same for most to find a reason to avoid the dreaded task of studying for examples going to gym and you study later but later comes and you are hooked to your computer hacking Facebook or watching movies. Tic- Tac holds a good reason on the status on where I am coming from stating, “there are many reasons the sleep deprivation monster comes to claim you as his own. Aside from the usual staying up too late, people's favourite excuse is studying for exams (Note to self: start studying sometime soon!). Probably a little closer to the truth, now is the time people choose to start stocking up on wild party memories as with the rapid approach of swot week many social lives are about to hit a deadening halt (http://www.1styearspread.blogspot.com/)”.

In the end we have to stand up to the wrongs that we encompass and learn from mistakes because university is not just about academic learning, but learning and testing your boundaries and realising who you are and where you want to be in the years ahead of you. That is what it is all about, life takes you in one direction but you are in the driver’s seat where you hold the power to shape your future.

Romantic Baggage Drags You Down

Being a first year student is all about independence, trying new things, meeting new people, spending your money on alcohol and definitely not for bringing romantic baggage. Part of the varsity experience is meeting new people who you find attractive and to explore with your sexual boundaries, without having to have a mental picture of your boyfriend/girlfriend in the back of your mind while you are making progress and may be well on your way to exploring new habits.
In my opinion starting an exciting, eventful adventure as a first year student at Rhodes cannot be reached when you are emotionally attached to a person that is far away while new talent is catching the corner of your eye every time you walk to a new lecture. Every time you enjoy an eventful night out, and I speak on behalf of the students at Rhodes when I say eventful, as absolutely anything can happen during your journey from the union all the way to friar tuck, as you encounter new energetic students that will most likely share the same party instincts as yourself. Sharing the same philosophy as myself on relationships is Pink Monkey, from http://www.bungeemylife.blogspot.com/, who believes that, “Long Distance relationships go with university like toothpaste goes with orange juice! When you go to university in another town you should break up with your boy/ girl friend because you will cheat on them.” As much as you think you have the will power to say no, the truth is that the temptation will always be there, at every bar and across every street. Its only human to get attracted to the opposite sex and want to get intimate, so rather safe yourself the pain and temptation and approach Rhodes as a single, excited new first year, open to all chances and challenges. In my experience, as my matric year came to an end, I told myself to let go of the past and to open my doors to new possibilities, not only because of matric rage which lay ahead, but I new I was coming to Rhodes, a university flooding with potential and talent, and I recommend this step to all matrics that are willing to attempt a long distance relationship. Within all relationships both partners are required to make an effort. With a long distance relationship the effort is just a bit more. It is about making a conscious attempt everyday to make your relationship work.
This is only my opinion, therefore I’m not telling you to just throw your relationship away, if you have a good thing going then by all means take the plunge, but most students know that it will make life a lot easier for both partners if you each start fresh as first year students. The commitment asked for a long-distance relationship is intense and it just builds up unnecessary stress onto yourself when you are actually here to have a good time, so to save yourself a lot of pain, stress and sleepless nights get rid of the itch and party hard.

The Escapades of Spineless and Sparrow.

Mini-Tornado Ravages Grahamstown.

Who ever thought that a tornado would be hit Grahamstown let alone South Africa, the world is changing and becoming more unpredicatable and disasterous, what will be next? Here is the Scoop.

Port Elizabeth - The Eastern Cape has been hit by severe storms.
A mini-tornado struck Grahamstown on Wednesday, damaging buildings, while more than 75mm of rain has fallen in Port Elizabeth, flooding roads.
Several flights to and from PE have been affected by the rain.
The Port Elizabeth weather office has warned that the bad weather is expected to continue for the rest of the day.
Several roads in the Nelson Mandela Bay area have been flooded and many residents from PE's northern areas couldn't get to work because of this.
Pupils were also sent home early.
In Sherwood a house which had been struck by lightning, was razed.
Hail has fallen in both Port Elizabeth and Uitenhage.
News 24

Standing Amongst us Mere Mortals.

A hero may be defined as a man with distinguished courage or ability, admired for his brave deeds and noble qualities. Well that is just the basis on what is defined as a hero, but an individual that stands out amongst the many scoundrels that inhabit our promised land with the attributes to go a step forward where most do not dare to dwell, that is the significant factor that makes a person a hero.
The person, the man that I admire, is none other than Dennis Barrett, a first year BSC student presiding at the infamous Rhodes University. Before his admission to Rhodes, Dennis is from Benoni, Johannesburg and this is the place and the past of his life, which stood out for me. This is where his story began and caught my attention, for ten years of his life Dennis was home schooled, having no friends at all and with that no social life at all, only his parents and family to fill that void, but he did not mind. He said, “This is not a defining factor for me, I had my work, my family and I didn’t need anything else in my life, I can easily survive by myself and I don’t need friends to get me by from day to day”, laughing at the idea of the question.
Looking at me with that wicked smile of his he stated, “Being in home school was easy, the work was simple and nothing really challenged my ethics. So the times had come for change and to get out of the house hold, try something different and going across the country and away from my comfort zone seemed the best way to start a new chapter in my life”. Standing in from of his new residence, Jan Smuts House, for the first time, knowing nothing of its reputation, feeling more nervous than he has in his life and but stepping across the threshold none the less. Going through the steps of things, sighing back to the start, “I was apprehensive with what I was in store for me but soon got into the motion of thing, still didn’t need friends here and didn’t go looking for them, they found me”. Through Orientation Week it came to him that he had never saw this part of life, all these mad individuals running around with no care in the world, he did not know what was going on, university was a place to learn, not to go wild. His first taste of real party was the street party at the end of O-Week, “My first real taste of what it was to be free, my first taste of liquor, and not knowing my boundaries of this newfound glory, it turned into a messy battle to try to get home”. As time goes by the battle to win between his social and academic balance, the war always seems to favour Dennis, as his grades are one of the best in this institution, practically he is a boy genius.
Over the course of this year, he has not only survived all the perils that Rhodes has given to him but he has also survived the many challenges that he has come past on this twisted road. Going from this shy and yet innocent young lad, to the guy who is up for the conquest of his future and not backing down for anything that is being put in his way whether it being good or bad.

New meaning to the word "hero"

When we think of a hero we immediately think of someone who is strong, intelligent, and brave in an extreme situation, a warrior or a man admired for his outstanding achievements and noble qualities. An example of this prolonged definition would be Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Indeed he is. But many different qualities than these have become noticeable. Courage, honesty, selflessness, and persevere are just a few other. A person who has outlived difficult journeys, challenges, endures much resistance, and learnt valuable lessons about survival and self-reliance by just being in first year, should also be considered a hero, such a person is Q Mabuza.

In the eyes of many, 20 year old Qawekazi, a young Zimbabwean first year student is another type of hero that almost no one is aware of. Sitting curled up in her bed with her hands across her legs, she comes to consciousness and begins to tell me about her life as a first year, and the risk that came attached with it. She explained to me in great detail that as an international student the admission process to any university is not very easy, that the only way she could attend university was for her to receive a bursary and study accounting “like most international students at Rhodes”, she said, adamantly.

Through her determination of wanting to further her education she received a bursary and made her way to Rhodes University. Her second and beginning of third term at Rhodes was a very tiresome time for her, she hated and wanted to change her degree and because of her June examination results, was informed that her performance was not satisfactory and was at a risk of exclusion from the university. Thus she did what she had always wanted to do, she changed her degree and decided that she was going to major in Drama. “Lance Armstrong, the famous cyclist and more importantly, cancer survivor, has said 'if you ever get a second chance for something, you've got to go all the way.'” she said, with her crystal eyes staring at me and revealing the bright future that lies in front of her. She took that second chance as much as it was a risk.

Q had always wanted to study Drama but her parents would not allow her to. She justified her parent’s decision of refusing her to study Drama as the pressure of life’s social standards that parents need to maintain, which leads them to force their children into studying something that they are not passionate about. But Q became a survivor of her parents’ pressures into who she really was; a performer. Part of her challenging journey is the lie that she has kept from her parents, who currently believe that their daughter is studying accounting. “Its like fungi, it starts at one point and spreads through everything...eating away at my soul with every lie”, she said.

At the end of the year when her results come out, Q will have to explain to her parents why she changed her degree, in the hope that they will understand and her result will way the options in her direction; “so I’m a prisoner standing trial”, she exclaimed. In life many people make wrong choices that lead them to prison. She made a choice that is risky, but in the end, will free her of the shackles.

By Nkuli

Trust Yourself

“Letter to Shaz,” on the blog called pressure points, brought back the memory of a letter I wrote to my younger self. This letter (letter to Shaz) conversed about the experience of turmoil times during ones youth which result in the realisation of the importance of life and the appreciation of self.
To the writer of this letter I truly appreciate how you emphasised on the subject of friends and how friends have the power of persuasion; this evoked the memory of my letter on how persuasion leads to compromising of self.
Your words to Shazaad, spoke to me. My letter spoke to my younger self about my experiences and to learn from them, I wanted her to remember to always know who she is and where she is going in life. You told Shazaad not to neglect certain parts of life and said to, “trust in yourself, only you know your true limits and stick to your principles.”
I thank you for empowering her in every way possible, making her believe that whenever she is disheartened positive thinking will help her overcome anything. This will make our younger selves appreciate the beauty of their minds because beyond doubt, thoughts do manifest into reality.

From

Nkuli@Riskybusinessrodents.blogspot.com comment to etto-pressurepoints.blogspot.com