Beginning at Bristol

It seems strange now to think that I only moved into my halls of residence two months ago. Time has flown by!  Although I initially found the prospect of moving to a new city, the next ‘big step’ in my life, quite a daunting one, I’ve settled into Bristol incredibly quickly. My halls, Clifton Hill House, have been everything I hoped for, with a wonderful student support team and great new friends who have made the transition to university life that bit smoother.  I’ve found Bristol itself to be an incredibly exciting and cultural city, full of many exciting things to see and do, but I still have much more to explore!

Now that I’ve found a routine, I’ve started to enjoy all aspects of my degree in Italian and German. The Italian and the German departments have both been so helpful and willing to engage with students about any initial issues we may have had. As an ab initio student, I struggled with German at first, since it’s very different from the languages I had studied before. However, now that I’ve started to get my head around it, I’ve been having a lot of fun, even if the language programme remains quite intense. There have also been all sorts of events put on within the School of Modern Languages, which have helped to deepen my enthusiasm for my subject. I particularly enjoyed the screening of ‘Influx’, a new documentary about Italian immigrants living in London, organised by the Italian department. After the screening there was a lively discussion about some of the issues raised in the film with the director, Luca Vullo, and it was fascinating to hear people’s opinions, especially those of Italian staff and students living and working in Bristol. I then wrote an article about this event for the Italian student magazine, La Civetta.

Outside of my studies things have been rather hectic but fun, having joined the JCR at Clifton Hill House a few weeks ago, meaning that I represent the student body and help to organise events and entertainment. We are very busy planning our Christmas party at the moment, which we hope will be very successful, although we are increasingly feeling the pressure as the date approaches! I also applied to be on Bristol’s University Challenge team for 2017, and although I made it to the last twenty, I didn’t quite go through the final stage of selection. Despite this, it was still a great experience and I intend to try out again next year. I’m having a great time here at Bristol, and can’t wait to see what the next 3 years hold!

– Thomas