For the first two days I was dutiful with daily notes, catching my thoughts as they came by, jotting them down in bed at the end of the day.
However, since last Monday, the busy-ness began and I became caught up in it all, leaving me with a lot of thinking to cram into a short amount of time.
The highs have been high, and the lows have been low. A week of slow days centered around fast-paced nights of drinking, dancing and chatting far too late into the morning.
New friends who, despite having only just met, feel like old mates. Heavy moments of loneliness, closely followed by refreshing contentness.
I have also learnt of another contradiction: there is something that separates a fresher from the rest of the student body — something so distinctive, yet we can never understand exactly what it is.
We ask those who yell "Fresher, fresher!" to us "How do you know?" but to no avail — the answer continues to be: "It’s just obvious."
As I’ve settled into student life, the ways in which a fresher is spotted become more apparent each day. We all have something to prove.
It’s clear not only in our fashion or our new uni bags, but in the way we move.
Despite that week of late nights, we have this energy, an excitement. We overcompensate for our unfamiliarity with eagerness.
And it is, in fact, just obvious.
O Week threw us into the deep end, spitting us out into the first lectures. "Fresher" is evident in the stumble we took as we landed.
Student life is about striking that balance specific to our own needs. Each of us is finding that limit to which we can push ourselves to.
Socialising and studying: two contradictory activities, yet are essential.
Balancing such opposites — not just within dynamics of freshly formed friend groups, but yourself — is difficult.
While perhaps nothing feels right, perhaps a lot feels wrong, I believe this mess adds to the beauty of this stage of life.
There is an unspoken permission to try new things, to broaden your knowledge, to find your values and morals — especially as you seek such aspects in those around you.
It feels incredibly audacious to say, but I have truly met some gorgeous people — some of whom I am lucky enough to now even call my friends.
I owe O Week a significant amount. The past days have been not solely about the amount of fun at each event, but respect towards others’ perspectives — which I think we are all learning.
There has been an inherent levelling of the playing field. I know that each person I say hello to, they too are feeling all that I am: loneliness, overwhelming stress, homesickness.
This mutual understanding creates common ground, and from there, a connection is already made — no matter if we become best friends or not.
The fact that this is only the first week of university is extremely surreal. It feels as if it has been years, while actually, we have so many more days ahead of us, all together, on this campus.
I can’t express just how excited I am to see all that’s waiting for me within these next semesters.
And something else I’ve learnt this week: fresher flu is no joke. A new kind of perseverance is formed as I strain to hear my lecturer’s voice over the cacophony of coughing, sniffing students.
In fact, that’s likely how you identify a fresher — a nasally voice and a runny nose.
• Eleanor Wong is a Dunedin first-year University of Otago student.
