Parents, Friends and Bassoons: what to do with them
How to survive a university visit from your family and friends
(and some stuff about wind instruments, too)
They have looked after you for the first eighteen/nineteen years of your life. They wiped every tear, kissed better each scraped knee. They also forced cabbage down your throat, embarrassed you in front of your friends and insisted you learn the contrabassoon, despite all your protests.
And now that you’ve all grown up and gone to university, they’re coming to visit. Parents: whether you’re expecting cuddles or cringe, they’re coming to stay. Since they’re visiting, you might as well make the best of it.
But how?
Plan ahead…by which I mean clean
It’s probably a good idea to make your house look presentable. Show off your independence. No parent wants to discover that, without them, their offspring is a dribbling slob. And if they’re really impressed, they might even take you out for a meal. So, get that spray out, remind your housemates about the rotas they’re ignoring and get cleaning.
Keep them distracted
Now, when family visit, they want to know what your new life is like. So show them. This doesn’t mean taking them to a three-hour lecture on advanced calculus (but then, they did force you to learn the bassoon) but do give them a tour around the campus and show them the city sites.
If like me, you’re studying in Nottingham, a trip to Nottingham Castle, complete with the mandatory photo by the Robin Hood statue, is a sure parent-pleaser.
if you’re not lucky enough to have a real castle to show off, some of the things to do previously covered in the student blog are perfect for fun trips with your folks.
Consider your reputation
A big question you have to ask yourself is whether you should introduce them to any of your friends?
Naturally, they’ll want to find out what species of student is influencing their young darling, but then you might not want them to know.
If you are blessed with understanding, unembarrassing parents or presentable, personable friends, then by all means let the two worlds collide. But otherwise, like wine and beer, it’s generally safer to keep the two apart.
Consider your reputation part 2
Speaking of friends, it’s not only parents who might visit. Those comrades from your younger days, against all odds, might actually make good on their promise to visit you at university. The key thing here, to avoid arguments, is to decide beforehand who’s responsible for what.
Cash
When hosting friends from afar there’s a lot to take into account: travel costs, food costs, where everyone is going to sleep. Work out who’s footing the bill for what. Travelling can be very expensive as anyone who’s stepped foot on a train will know (get a railcard, if you haven’t already!) so don’t make them pay for their journey and then insist they pay for their food as well.
Either let the visitor pay for travel while the host pays for everything else, or, for the more parsimonious among you, just split everything equally.
Space
Now, to be a good host, you shouldn’t be asking anyone to pay up for a Travelodge. Even if you ended up with the pokiest room, or your bassoon just takes up too much space to allow a roll mat down, at the very least offer them the sofa. Or time things well for when a housemate is away and make use of their empty room.
Tea
At the end of the day, and, indeed, the beginning, you are the host. You are in charge. But that means you’ve got the planning responsibilities. When visitors arrive, they don’t want to then make the decisions as to what you’re going to do. They’ll definitely want a cup of tea. So, buy in those teabags, come up with a plan of action, and get organised.