The Great British Escape

Amid the fury at the Browne Review's proposal to catapult the cap on UK tuition fees into the stratosphere (up to £10,000 per year), a typically deadpan nugget of truth (with a side order of despair) was served to my class by our university tutor: our year could well be one of the last who needn't have money to burn to study at university for the foreseeable future. It sounds like poor teenagers will have to grill hamburgers a little longer before they enrol in an Applied Golf Management Studies Degree.
So, who saw this coming? Anyone with a vision more acute than Mr Magoo, to tell you the truth. The Lib-Con coalition may pose as some sort of 'Best of' political party fusion but the Tory domination is as clear as day. David Cameron is the one driving the country into a rich man's haven whilst Nick Clegg is little more than a grinning bozo in his sidecar. Students aren't just being sold down the river; they're being pushed towards the edge of a waterfall with a hoard of blood-thirsty, smartly dressed sharks lurking at the bottom. Still, perhaps university degrees are worth the tens of thousands of pounds for which students will have to fork out. It's not like Jobcentre queues are getting longer or degrees are becoming less worthwhile. Oh, wait...
The solution, it has been manifested, may be abroad. Holland's Maastricht University has been fluttering its eyelashes to UK students with its seductive £1500 a year tuition fees, availability of places and English speaking courses, not to mention the added bonus of being in the top 1% of the world's universities. And though China's tuition fees may be steep, Westerners can expect to be showered with free booze at their clubs and bars, for being Westerners. All in all, universities overseas must be rubbing their hands in glee at the prospect of bringing in more UK students, whilst British universities will be hanging their heads in anguish at the distinct likelihood of losing scores of foreign students.
As always, thousands of soon-to-be UK students will currently be travelling continents such as Asia, filling their gap year with new, life affirming experiences before embarking a university course in 2011. With a nebulous financial future, the percentage of those who have been alerted to the perks of overseas courses is unclear, but one thing's for sure, they'd be better off pitching their tents and seeking worldly wisdom from local Buddhists than pursuing an education in the United Kingdom.

Here's to blowing off the cobwebs

If this blog was a building, it would be collecting moss and all sorts of pests by now. If it was a CD, it would be at the bottom of the bargain bin (though I'd like to think it would sell more copies than Steve Brookstein). The distance between each entry has expanded at the same rate as Penélope Cruz's waistline.

This doesn't sit well with me, dudes and dudettes, so I'd like to bridge the gap with this little forget-me-not, which will put me under pressure to ensure I resume my pointless rambling on here very soon. Excited? I don't blame you.

Welcome to the house of fun

Earlier this evening, over several £2 glasses of ice with squirts of cocktail, I and two friends meeted and greeted a couple of potential housemates for next year. Between you and me, this was quite the audition process masquerading as a light and frothy "We'll have so much fun!" cringefest. Mentally we were all sketching a deep psychological profile of these two girls; though in my haste to swig my drinks before the ice melted (excellent excuse for appearing like a raving sauce monster), mine might not have been the most accurate. Quite frankly, the only reason we didn't have America's/Britian's Got Talent style electronic bells and a pair of hovering large red Xs is because, well, we were clean out.
Ahhh yes, housesharing. A phenomenon in which those fresh-faced, palsy-walsy strangers' quirks and foibles will be peeled away like an artichoke, one leaf after another. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt and spilt my cocktail down it. I feel so well-versed in the subject I could write an entire blog entry on it.
I've shared a university flat with 3 others for several months, and as I'm reaching the end of my tenure I'm also reaching the end of my tether. This has been tricky! After the honeymoon period of Freshers' Week, it has been a mighty ordeal tolerating this fine mix of characters. From many of my university chums, I hear nothing but delightful tales of the escapades they share with their flatmates. But in my questionable mind, I wonder how the dickens you can be besties with someone with whom you're competing for the bathroom? Or the oven? Trust me, during the many times I've slaved over a hot stove (in true Jamie Oliver fashion) and someone's hanging around like an unpaid bill, I've often pondered the less culinary and more blustery uses of certain cooking utensils.
But, as the end draws ever closer I can already foresee the wistfulness with which I'll look upon my soon-to-be former flatmates. Not least the chap one room down, blaring Dubstep at multi-figure decibels, only pausing to whack a frozen pie in the oven. Perhaps I'm even putting him on the pedestal, but I'm starting to see him as a guardian angel sent down to purge me of the belief that Dubstep constitutes music. Thank you! I'm cured!
When it all boils down to it though, the flatsharing has been the singular disappointing aspect of university life for me. In university accommodation, the flatmates with whom you share is a lottery. So I'm cherishing the houseshare audition process, shouting "Rejected. Next!" and dropping them down a trap door (well, we're working on that). You may well not have a clue what I'm talking about, but if you're planning on making that step up to university life...well, in the words of Lester Burnham, "you will someday."

Some creative writing

My pals call me Guillaume, but I’d prefer you address me formally. Je m’appelle...Bill. I’m in a spot of bother. Real hot water. The water’s so hot I’m cooking like a motherflippin’ pot roast. I’ll tell you what happened, just hold on tightly because this is a bumpy ride.
This is my apartment in Paris. The most romantic city in the world. Getting here was tougher than getting into a nun’s bedroom, but I persevered because I just had to up sticks and move out of that two-bit town I used to call home. Full of people getting sozzled and being sick on neighbourhood cats, chubby pramfaces fattening their kiddies up, presumably in order to eat them one day, people who think Family Guy is a great comedy. So I landed here.
It’s a glorious lifestyle with me and my French buddies – Florence, Lorraine, Gabrielle. Oh, don’t let the names fool you. Those boys are as soft as a Normandy camembert. We enjoy the typical saucy hi-jinx a quartet of eligible bachelors tends to indulge in. We like the legal high of excessive tulip sniffing. We enjoy reading poetry to our favourite Mademoiselles, usually our mothers. We have fun playing poker; although due to our ignorance of the rules our game is somewhat a cross between Bridge and Three Card Monty.
But our main passion is art, which is the crux of my dilemma. Many’s the afternoon we spend at the Musee Du Louvre, eyeing up exhibitions by our favourite avant-garde artist Monsieur Sacrebleu, a neurotic painter who once claimed to have heard his parrot recite Gestalt’s principles of perception. We love his distorted human-figure paintings so much that last week we adorned ourselves in our Catwoman Halloween outfits and snuck into the gallery at 4am and stole three of his paintings.
Unfortunately I drew the short baguette and it is my apartment in which they are being stored, our plan now is shrouded in uncertainty. One of them is facing me now, a framed portrait of a pasty, troll-like creature in deep disarray....Oh, my mistake, that’s a picture of my aunt Harriet. Ahh Harriet, you were once the most beautiful lady in Liverpool, now you barely scrape the top 3.
I digress. I pontificate. Put simply, the rozzers are onto me. Truth be told, on that infamous night a couple of Winos on a park bench caught us hurtling the paintings towards my apartment. We let them be as we assumed they were drunk out of their minds on their bottle of Bordeaux, but perhaps they were simply admiring its bouquet.
Oh goodness, perhaps they’ve already been to the police department! The police force are very open-minded in this region. After they snootily laugh in your face and spit on your shoes they’ll more than likely take note of your report.
Dear oh dear, I can’t take it. They could be here at any time. They’ll find those paintings and that will be it! I’m facing years behind bars! I must confess, only in order to facilitate the situation. I hope the boys will forgive me, though considering their delicate features, prison may be too hellish for them to ever pardon me!
Thank you for listening, old boy. I must now turn myself in, once I offer a spot of herbal tea to those fine uniformed chaps knocking on my door.

You can take the town out of the boy...

Coming from small-town England, I've long had a fascination with the neon glow of the cosmopolitan city. I can ascribe the dawn of my love for Manchester to a fairly standard event some years ago. My parents and I were about to see the musical Miss Saigon at the Palace Theatre, and in the spirit of boycotting their £20 shot-glasses of ice cream at intervals, we decided to buy some sneaky snacks from Sainsbury's instead. As I wandered the store I took in the hoards of frantic students with baskets full of economy vodka and skittles, presumably to make Skittle Vodka. I romanced the image all out proportion, presuming they were all buying supplies for every kind of glamorous shindig one could imagine - house parties, raves, orgies, LSD banquets, goat sacrifices, etc. My eyes lit up like the printworks at dusk.
X years down the line (I don't do specifics) and here I am in my swanky condominium at the heart of the city. Hmm, perhaps I'm selling it short somewhat. It's actually a student flat on the outskirts of the city centre, situated by the Don of newsagents. Oh, you consider that less glamorous? Well excuse me, miss Hilton.
I arrived in the city with dreams of becoming a playboy city-slicker. I was going to put the Mad in Madchester (even though some doped up swines from the 80's got there before me). Though after a wild opening week to university life and one jaw-dropping look at one's bank balance cascading towards the red zone, it's clear that a student can't paint the town red every night. Sometimes you just have to be tickled pink with a ready meal and a rerun of Top Gear. The city seems like a feast for the rich, and we're the whimpering paupers pressing out noses against the window. Oh, happy days!
Yet despite all of this, it really is a wonderful city. I woke up yesterday at 6am to take some photos for my university course's 'Creative Practice' unit and its hidden cultural gems really do twinkle in the dark. Small towns may have their charm, but it's the buzz of the cosmopolitan city that keeps one's heart racing.
And one final note. Though I told you that one can't always paint the town red, a significant reason is that the town doesn't need it. Because despite what Manchester City fans will tell you, Manchester is red.

Introduction to construction

If you noticed this blog before the inaugural entry, you may have considered this to be another "Flight of fancy New Year's Resolution". You've got some attitude, sir. Alas though, you're definitely half correct, for it has taken the charade of New Year inspiration to give me that compulsory boost. So here we are!
The name's Martyn, and I sincerely welcome to this currently under-construction little blog. Is this the easy part? Or the hard part? Getting this first little icebreaker comfortably in one's rear view certainly makes it seem as though it's a smooth ride on Easy Street from here on, though lest I forget I am delivering this introduction to the blogging equivalent of a Flight of the Conchords audience (and I'm talking about their hapless fictional counterparts).
Where to now, I ponder. I've always prided myself on my decent grasp of the Queen's English and after too many months of procrastination I've decided to dive right in and set up a blog. I just write what's on my mind grapes...

And this is the world as I see it!