Student Accommodation - the Experience
Updated: 7 hours ago
There’s something that sets student accommodation apart from any other accommodations - the vibe, the common rooms, the seemingly-endless parties (pardon me, gaffs), the horde of clueless first-years. Whether you stay in uni or private student accommodation, catered or self-catered, odds are you will end up having strong opinions about your first-year housing - one way or another.
Most student accommodations have a flat system and all of them, apart from Pollock, are self-catered. You have your own bedroom in a flat of about 3 to 6 people with a shared kitchen, common room and one or more bathrooms. Unlike halls, flats put you in really close quarters with your flatmates as you practically live with them and share so many common facilities. Kitchens are almost always induction-based and all of them have ovens that I'd advise making extensive use of; there are also microwaves, but their quality... may not be what you expect or are used to. In terms of the flatmates you get, you can either get lucky or very, very unlucky, but if you’re really dissatisfied with your house, you can apply for a change in the second semester.
While private accommodation will leave you to fend for yourself, student accommodation has super friendly staff to ease you in. Housekeepers will come by regularly (usually once a week) to clean common spaces such as common rooms and bathrooms. They won’t, however, clean your rooms, so you’re happy to keep it as messy as you like - but they do provide mops and Hoovers (vacuum cleaners) in all flats.
An inescapable part of living in student accommodation (and in Edinburgh in general) is the alcohol and smoking culture. There are parties throughout the week, and you will find people smoking at all times of day. Scotland is known for its Scotch whiskey and there is Irish beer in plenty, accompanied by every other kind of alcohol you can think of. Buying cigarettes in Edinburgh is expensive - a lot of people find it cheaper to roll their own cigarettes. This represents only a part of the population; there are plenty of students who choose to not drink or smoke, and there isn’t really any pressure to indulge if you don’t want to, although it may help to put checks if you find yourself susceptible to influence.
Pollock Halls
A lot of people pick Pollock because it’s catered. The restaurant at JMCC serves two meals a day – breakfast (brunch on the weekends) and a very early dinner (5pm to 8pm). The quality of food is an ever-falling graph. Breakfast is slightly better than dinner, and while you’ll be stuck eating the same food day after day, at least it’ll be edible food. I cannot vouch for the fact that JMCC coffee is all decaf, but I can confirm that the hot chocolate is a must-try. The saving grace of dinner, often, is the coveted JMCC brownie. Available for brief moments before running out, it is the one thing that can transform your dinner experience (or be traded in the Pollock black market). Apart from that, you’ll likely be picking half your dinners from the salad bar and convincing yourself you’re eating healthy.
There are 100 reasons I love Pollock and JMCC food is not one of them.
The key to the Pollock experience is the social life. You see people from all parts of the world and since they’re all clueless first-years, it’s very easy to socialise. You may or may not be friends with your neighbours, but you will have the choice to interact with people only as much as you want to. There is a good support system in place for student wellbeing – RAs are typically third-year undergraduate students who are your first point of contact for anything you need, wardens help out in more serious matters, and community support is available 24/7 for out-of-hours assistance. Pollock reception is open on weekdays from 10 to 5 and is staffed by super friendly and helpful people; it’s also where you go to collect most of your parcels. Many parcels will be delivered to the lockers in the reception that you can access at any time with a password that is sent along with the delivery confirmation, while the biggest ones need to be collected from the reception staff during working hours. Smaller parcels are delivered to the mailbox in your house. There is also a stock of menstrual products just behind the reception, freely available to anyone who needs it.
Pollock is a 20-minute walk away from the nearest campus. By Edinburgh standards, it’s not the closest, and it also means that you’re not very close to a lot of other students (except Salisbury Court). The location of Pollock isn't bad by
any standards, you’re just behind Holyrood Park and on the foot of Arthur’s Seat.
There’s supermarkets and restaurants within a 10-minute walk, and enough students in Pollock that you won’t feel isolated at all (even though you will see a lot of the same faces). A lot of students in Pollock are international – predominantly Indian, Chinese and American. About half the people are British, with too many fitting into the Pollock stereotype of rich London private school folks. While some people do tend to form their own bubble, it’s quite easy to talk to people from backgrounds different than yours. Wardens and RAs also organise events and activities like pizza parties, movie screenings and day trips, which are really good to interact with your house mates.
Since Pollock is catered housing, it doesn’t have kitchens. It has pantries with a microwave, kettle and toaster. Rules don’t allow you to bring electric hot plates and cook, and there are smoke alarms that may go off if you do. Smoke alarms are an essential part of the Pollock experience (so much so that they became an elaborate prank during Halloween 2021 with the Holland House Murderer) and there will be days when you’ll be forced to leave the room at 4 am, poorly equipped for the cold, just because some person burnt their toast or decided to smoke in their room.
There is a shop and bar located in Pollock itself, both in JMCC. The shop has basic groceries including cold medicine, chocolates, milk and sandwiches (very rarely does it stock toilet paper, though). The bar is one of the cheaper ones in Edinburgh; it closes relatively early but it’s a good place to socialise with friends. All of the houses also have vending machines with chips (I mean, crisps) and chocolates; some even have soft drinks.
Pollock is also big on biodiversity – there are multiple signs indicating hedgehog sightings and there is an apiary in the complex too. You’ll see squirrels everyday, occasionally the Pollock fox (if you think you see a stray dog- it’s a fox) and if you’re very lucky, maybe even the Pollock cat. There are also squash courts in Pollock that are due to be operational in 2022 from what I hear.
The facilities in Pollock are everything I’d expected and more. But in all honesty, Pollock is more than the facilities and the food. It’s about the people, the experience and the spirit. Embrace the difference and the uncertainty, and prepare to live what could well be one of the best years of your life.
Pro tip: Become friends with an RA. It helps. There's a super friendly and chill Indian RA in Lee House this year - feel free to go say hi!
Psst, there's more where this came from. New posts every Friday. Follow @diyagoel4712 on Instagram for more updates!
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