Rooted – Student Life at La Trobe

I used to wake up to the sound of all those fucking birds outside my window on the second floor of Tower 2 at Chisholm College. I actually miss it now. I would often just sit and look out my large window at the beautiful scenery – but also all the funny shit that happens at the boom gates between car parks 2 and 3. At the very edge of my view from the window, there’s a market every Sunday, where I would buy my bread and another poor plant to add to my shrinking collection. At 6pm most weeknights, I’d walk the 500 metres to the library and study for a few hours. For some reason, I found it so easy to be productive with just a handful of what I presumed to be hardworking students in the room with me.

These are some of my fonder uni memories. But this was all before covid.

The following year, I watched the building next to Glenn College slowly get bigger until it obscured my small window view. The same window I looked out of day in and out of the first lockdown. Because the campus was now rid of students, I could take my hour of daily exercise in peace. My appreciation of the environment of the campus grew. But the agora never looked smaller. Bereft of traffic, it felt out of place when I would go to grab the occasional bento box from Caffeine. And yet, they always ran out of the good sushi so quickly. Go figure.

During the exam period that year, res students could get one free coffee a day at Grafalis. Some two years later, thanks to a new addiction to spice chai lattes, I am a regular and can often be seen giving glaring looks to Steve when he hands me my drink (you know who you are, thanks ma’am).

Nowadays, things around La Trobe don’t feel quite the same. The air is different, but I also think perhaps I’m just a bit jaded and rooted. University can be a demanding lifestyle at times – I’m sure I don’t need to elaborate. Nonetheless, what hasn’t changed is that I love being a student here. No, things aren’t perfect, and there is certainly some disillusionment, but I wouldn’t go elsewhere.

I’m rooted here, in the other sense of the word. La Trobe is my home, for better or worse.

I love coming to campus, grabbing a brekky wrap and a coffee and sitting in the agora with my friends. One by one, we’ll leave and go to our classes, club meetings or student council obligations. After class, if I’m feeling like a good uni student, I’ll go to the third level of the library and join everyone else in productive silence. Or watch a movie in peace. Or just go to Therapy and sit in the booths pretending to do work. Maybe grab some snacks from IGA if my bank account lets me. I honestly hate to think how much money I will spend here between tuition, rent and food by the eventual time I graduate.

This is my fourth year at La Trobe. I’ll still be here at least another year, watching the jaffys look around aimlessly as they try to find their classes, keeping up with student council shenanigans from afar, watching Rabelais continue to grow after me, submitting assignments minutes before the deadline, and heading to the Peacock Hotel for club events.

I implore you to get involved too, if you can. My student life is all the richer for it.

P.S Someone bring back Stollies Tuesdays; I only got to experience that once. Thank fuck for the glider service!