Big Waves: the First Year of Uni

I’m back, returned to the safe abode of my child-sized single bed (yes, even smaller than a single bed, imagine), surrounded by the remnants of A Level notes and things-I-forgot-to-clean-up-last-semester, because, I am back from uni.

First year is done, I have said a fond and only temporary farewell to university, as I spend the summer back home. And, let me tell you, the cliche of ‘rollercoaster’ is the only way to describe this year (admittedly it has only been 8 1/2 months, to my paying parents’ horror). And, although I have been rather quiet on this blog - ahem, only posting in the first week of uni, apologies - I wanted to make up for it by writing about some of the adventures, the discoveries, the revelations, the horrors, epiphanies, madness, tiredness, dance moves and more of my first year at university.

A happy chappy because I loved my first year of uni

While thinking about this whole year, I watched through my Second A Day, the handy app where you take a video a second long everyday, like a visual diary (because, although I love writing, I cannot for the life of me keep a diary). And I highly recommend it! But anyway, I digress - and am not being paid for this shout out - and should start where uni starts: at the beginning.

THE BEGINNING

It was 22nd September, it was raining, and my parents and I were crammed into the car amongst and against literally everything but the kitchen sink: my flat already had that, but I’m sure if it didn’t, we would have had that on the roof too. Suitcases of clothes, shoes, bedding, books to study and read, notebooks, boxes to put in the books to study and read and write in, crockery, cutlery, pots, pans, and the all important fairy lights. I sat, feeling sick, sewing my halloween costume to keep myself busy as we drove the couple of hours to my new home. (In case you wondered, I went as Sally from Nightmare Before Christmas.)

Halloween Exhibit: Sharkboy and Sally

I remember I always told people my tactic of making friends in uni would be to bake goodies and hand them out, so my flatmates would be conditioned into linking deliciousness and happiness with me, and so would have to be my friend. Well, as I entered into my flat which I would soon call home for the next year, I had under my arm tins of chocolate cookies and vegan brownies (trust me, amazing) to lay out into the kitchen. And, while arranging my room, parents and flatmates alike wandered around and taking a cookie or two and we all had a natter and Flat 121 began to bond. Once the parents left, it was us four and our flat. And then we went out on our first night out and there started our friendship, the four amigos, dancing and boogying and coming back to our new home to chat and chow down until 3am.

Our first night and our first night out!

I honestly do not retain that much information about Freshers Week, except a lot of dancing until the sun began to rise, and arranging my lunchtimes so I could chat with my just-waking flatmates (I’m the only morning person, oops). But these were the good and although small, very cherished memories of Freshers Week, and all because I baked those brownies for my future flatmates.

121!

WHAT I LOVE TO DO

First semester is intense: you’re still going out while juggling 9am’s and wrapping your head around powerpoint slides whizzing by, while frantically writing down all of the information being spurted from lecturer and computer alike, all the while trying to keep your eyes open because of said night out before - and you are probably hungry too. And, if you know me and my absolute fear of doing the wrong thing (ah yes, a theme throughout my uni experience…) then you know that even if I was running on three hours of sleep, I would still be there at my 9am’s (and yes, in first semester, unfortunately this happened all too often). 

Tiring work waking up at normal person hours.

But, it’s not just work! There are exciting new experiences too, like the million and one clubs to join (well, actually over three hundred, as my uni offers the most societies of all uni’s in the country apparently!) and friends to try and make - and I did! I was determined not to give up dance, so joined Dance Society, gaining a group of gals who I could point my toes in time to (hello dance gals: you guys are great, thank you for all your dancing support!). And, you’re trying to cook for yourself and clean up and do everything on time too! But, that’s where I discovered another favourite: Aldi Shopping Saturday. The perfect way to use up a day (and by that, we all know this means a good excuse not to do any work, because of course we need to eat!), trundling the half-an-hour walk with pals to Aldi, wandering and perusing, peering at the prices and oggling at the oodles of rip-off names (‘Seal’ bars being my favourite, in substitute for ‘Penguin’s). And, if Aldi didn’t have it, we could walk another ten minutes to snoop around Sainsbury’s and have a gander around the isles. The hundreds and hundreds of isles. As apparently we lived by one of the biggest in the country. (I like the little things.) 

And of course, the all important nights out. And I love them. Because it means I can dance. I don’t drink, so going out for me is not about getting absolutely gone, sloshes, black-out drunk (theory: any word with the right oomph sounds like you’re talking about drink. See: I’m absolutely trolleyed / guttered / dunked / pleated / sunk) but about dressing up with my pals, laughing and screaming the words to Come on Eileen at each other, smiling so much your cheeks hurt afterwards, while throwing my arms and legs and hips and feet around everywhere, and call it dance. And, after all of that, Ubering back in that weary way that only night-out-goers feel, with a polystyrene box on your knee containing chips soaked in gravy, or my favourite of crumpets and chocolate spread in the warmth of your own flat. Yes, I adore going out, and miss it immensely since coming back.

A picture that is literally screaming party (sorry Ben)

Or, if we did not go out, all of us would bundle into my room (the best room, as voted for by everyone - including me) and sit jauntily on my bed as we pulled up the bedside cabinet to watch a film on my laptop. 

Film ready!

These moments were precious, and I want to take this sentence to say thank you to my flatmates and friends and all for these treasured memories. And for helping me through the next stage:

THE BIG SAD

With all these changes, new thoughts and experiences and independence are thrust upon you, weighing down your arms whether you want it or not, like holding your dirty underwear, as you wait for the laundry cycle to finish so you can bung them in and be done with it. Except, some things cannot just be thrown into a bunch of bubbles to come out just as new. Just like the October Strug. One of my flatmates decided their course was not for them, so moved uni’s forever and, in my new and not-improved way of coping, I cried. A lot. And then I got the dreaded Now. Is This Course The Right One For You? as I sat, slumped over my books, with the secondary reading I convinced myself I had to complete all of (probably the only one in the year to do so) piling higher and higher. And I cried some more. (Friends at uni cannot believe I never used to cry. Imagine.) And I was in a post-Fresher’s-Week-Slump, feeling like I would never meet any new people and meanwhile having barely anyone I could call a friend (I did not bake enough cookies to distribute so it seems). It was a depressing time and felt even sadder that I so desperately wanted to enjoy myself but I could not pull myself out of the Strug. (Side note: if you cope well with change and are a happy-go-lucky go-with-the-flow-er then this uni business will be just peachy! However, if you do struggle with change, just remember it is not always hard! It is daunting because of all of the new things flying at you - see above - but one thing is for sure: people are there for you! Trust me-) At one point I wanted to drop out, but boy am I glad I kept going, for the next adventure that was to come sure was the best…

CHRISTMAS AND GOOD TIMES

The Housing Situation. My goodness was it stressful. People were already buying houses in October and I just had no idea who to even live with, let alone sign a contract, put down a deposit and decide my house for next year, when I had only just removed the plastic packaging from the bedding to go into the new flat. It added to The Big Sad, but I was determined: I would live with my flatmate and his girlfriend and I would be that hitchhiking hermit, gripping stubbornly to their little boats as they sailed to other waters no matter what. So, when my flatmate was given an offer to live with some of his pals, I slid in there to. And, goodness me, what lovely friends I have made! There was an end to The Big Sad coming, and I did not know that until the incredible Christmas markets, and when I met The Boy.

Our soon-to-be housing group was messily assembling, no one quite sure who would be with who, and whether this amalgamation of science students and humanity kids could really find a house together. So, to deal with such a strenuous issue, we decided to bond, go to the pub and the markets and forget - temporarily - of the tiny trouble of buying a house.

While at the pub only a few days after I met my flatmate’s lovely friends (hello lovely friends), they had invited along The Boy who I decided there and then I would make my best friend (hello The Boy). I am not a forceful person - stubborn yes, but not manipulative - but I knew this is where I had to harness my I’m-Not-An-Introvert energy. Because, people in Freshers Week did not believe I was internally screaming at the crowds of people crushed into a tiny flat for prees, or panic-sweating in my bloodstream, as I struck up conversations with new people. (Yes, I did! It was me! Shy, nervous Helena, actually starting conversations! And people thought I was a confident extrovert! Incredible.) In Freshers Week, I decided that this was it: I needed to make friends, meet new people; I forced myself out of my shyness, pushed through the shaking hands, and with the biggest smile, said Hello, I’m Helena! For anyone catapulted into a situation with a bunch of new people, and are like me, a nervous weeny (new word and I love it. Reclaim it! We are all weenies!), honestly the best advice I can give is smile lots! This is not coming from a self-help guru, who meditates to align their aura with the universe, but someone who made friends this way! Smile, introduce yourself, or make a mundane comment about how busy it is, that you would be worried you were late, or you were underdressed - and the conversation will flow!

And this is what I applied to The Boy. (hello again The Boy.) He too was shy and quiet - just like I naturally am - so what a better person to hound with a big toothy grin and intertwine with question after question. We had lots in common, and I told him to come over for a cup of tea anytime (too afraid to tell him then that I did not like tea, but thought this was a warming gesture - keep reading to see if this damning, mountain of an obstacle halted my time with The Boy.) and sent him a message after that night to remind him I am always a pal he can call on.

A day or two later, this miscellaneous group went to the Christmas markets, and we laughed and slurped Bailey’s-soaked hot chocolate, and stared at the talking-reindeer head or the silky, warm Nutella goop from the ladle onto freshly-pressed waffles. I talked more to The Boy and cheekily asked if he would like to live with us - bold on the behalf of the whole eight of us, but I had a good feeling because-

First trip to the Christmas Markets - and it certainly was not the last!

A few days later, we were all home-owners. A quirky, extended house, with a little back garden, on a family road: perfect for a house of eight students? But we were going to make it our own and I was happy: The Big Sad of October had been forgotten. And a few days afterwards, The Boy and I got together (hello The Boy - if you are still reading that is, hehe).

And then the best time of year had enveloped us, wrapping us in the smells of an eleven-man Christmas roast (the best I have had - apart from mum’s of course, Hello mum) and brandy butter that I nestled under the lids of icing-sugar-sprinkled mince pies. We wrapped up warm in our newly-bought vintage oversized jumpers, and exchanged presents beside the two-foot Christmas tree, sat on the worktop of Flat 121. And, before I knew it, semester one was over.

Christmas dinner for eleven? Coming right up!

The proud home owners (that's us!)

THE BIG SAD PART TWO

I was floating on a calm sea. On my raft were my future and current flatmates, The Boy, my English gals and some chocolate spread possibly (definitely). It was a little cold, but life was good.

Until the crushing wave of Second Semester trampled my raft and cascaded most that were on it adrift. And, naturally, I was sad. The Big Sad Part Two.

Deadlines were sneakily crawling forth, I was writing and reading, but at the expense of other hobbies and shared conversations and memories. I was too worried to see friends, so I stayed curled up in my room. I was too scared to ask people to go out with me or do things, so I remained in, sad. I was in a permanent state of anxiety, even over what to wear or what to have for breakfast. The Boy let my tears dampen his jumpers and mascara stain his tops, as I cried, and longed for Christmas time only a month before to come again.

It was hard and has been. The Big Sad of October was a shock but in a way expected: take a girl who does not deal with change and add a big change, and that probably equals some kind of breakdown. But this was different: I was struggling to be the happy, child-with-Christmas-in-their-eyes girl again. And here is the real important side note: if you think you are struggling emotionally at uni, or you see someone else is, just ask - them or yourself! Is this you? Are you happy? Can I get you a cup of tea and a chat? Can you talk to someone? People may be talking about mental health, but it is hard when it is happening to you. But you can overcome it, or at least put a plaster on it for a little bit. Look after yourself everyone.

Thankfully I did get help (thank you to The Boy for supporting me through it), and although The Big Sad Part Two has not quite departed yet, some days I’m just riding that wave, as it brings me to my favourite things:

TRADITIONS

We have started a few traditions in the first year of uni, and I am determined to continue them all the way to third. These are my favourite things I have engrained into uni, as they bring me so much happiness and magpie them for yourself if you to are at uni!

First, Sunday Dinners. Every Sunday, one of the flatmates would cook for everyone, and we would sit down like a family - which we are (hello flatmate family) - and gobble greedily at the dishes put in front of us. From vegan carbonara to Moroccan stew, to pasta with homemade pesto (my birthday meal!) to pan-seared fish. Sometimes we had dessert too! And all so gorgeous, because we had made it for each other. Sunday Dinners were a way to take time out of work - particularly good in the exam season of Third Semester - and communally boogie as we scrubbed the dishes afterwards. And, despite The Big Sad Part Two testing me, The Boy still stuck around (to The Boy: thank you) and our own dual tradition grew: Date-Day Wednesday’s - AKA, an excuse for me to explore the vivacious city my uni was born to. Gardens and sunny parks and museums and slurping up broth-soaked noodles and crying at a beautiful scene playing in the cinema and baking and giddily running around aquariums to see the stingrays (my favourites!). 

Winterbourne Gardens - one of my favourite Date Day Wednesday's

And, after all of this, every week I would FaceTime my parents (hello mum again!) and tell them all about the yellow flowers I cupped in my palms at the botanical gardens, or the fudgy brownies that had just emerged from the oven, sending sweet steam around the kitchen. This all would tide me over to Aldi Shopping Saturday, and then more goodies could be looked forward to in the next week!

THE END

Third Semester came along, and while we pushed through exams, the Sunday Dinner menu still rolled on every week, and I still swam peaceful lanes in the pools, and we still watched films or shows while all scrambling onto a bed (my bed). Third Semester is dedicated to exams, so for a month my room was plastered with vibrant felt-tipped posters, and stacks of cue cards sat by my right elbow on my desk. It was stressful and draining (and I probably did have a little cry dotted around here and there) but by May 24th my exams were over and I was free to get back to exploring and laughing and sleeping and cooking and enjoying myself again. The Boy had his birthday and I had mine, we all dived and danced at the on-campus music festival and then we all hugged and said goodbye as one by one, we all departed the place I now call my second home.

It went all too quick.

The first year of uni has been a tie-dye of craziness: imagine a t-shirt coloured with the most eye-burning neon yellow, adjacent to the deepest night-sky inkiness, which is swirled into the sweetest candy-violet, splattered with a red like little fiery opals. I was wearing it this whole time (madwoman). And, I just cannot wait to go back again. Thank you to all of the friends, from my course, from dance, flatmates, future flatmates, friends-of-friends, Freshers pals I lost contact with, party-goers we merged with, everyone who made first year so incredible - especially The Boy, you are pretty great too.

In the beginning...

Me + boy, feat. our matching tartan, much to everyone's horror

After the night before

Flat gals

Ending with a smile

And this is only just a small summary of what I got up to! I could write for hours about all the adventures and catastrophes that occurred day-to-day, but I am sure I have already lost most of the people who began this blog post and then realised how long and rambling it is (and she wants to be a writer, ha!) so I will just leave you with one anecdote:

It was the day of my last exam. I had finished, so came skipping home to rip off my posters. I ate a delicious dinner cooked by The Boy and my parents were coming up the next day to celebrate, where I could show them my favourite places in the city. All was good. Except my head was itching and guess what, I had nits, so whichever pesky child or student gave them to me, I am coming for you. And I hid it from my flatmates too, so, hello flatmates if you made it this far. I am sorry. But nothing bad happened, did it? Ah, yes, a twenty-year-old asking her mum to bring up a nit comb from home really put the fat, splodgy cherry on top huh. Uni has taught me with everything good there could be a (tiny) bad, but then every bad certainly has a good: I got rid of the nits, had a lovely time with my parents and enjoyed the last two weeks of uni. And, I had extra soft hair at the end of it.

What a crazy year, as exhibited by me, looking crazy (sorry Ben, again)

***

Of course she would end on such a gross and unnecessary note of nits. Guess it means she had clean hair though. I'm thinking of posting some of the writing I created this year because, although I barely mentioned it, the actual reason I am at uni is to do a degree! I'm doing English & Creative Writing, so keep a peep out for some more stuff!

Why I Write

I write because I am not skilled at drawing.

For me, writing is my form of painting: the paintbrush, now a pen, dips into swirling colours of deep provocative thoughts, waxy metaphors, honey-sweetened syllables and an array of vivid, vibrant, exotic words that I otherwise could not justify on my tongue. I love art; love the way finite movements compose the most detailed, descriptive drawings of real life, or fantasy. Writing for me is the drawing I could never do: each word is strung up on a sentence washing line, wrangled by the wind and compressed by the sun, until each one melds together like that of graphite on paper. I write because my drawings are too bad to truly express what I am and that around me.

I write because I love to explore.

Well, I actual dislike exploring. Maybe not dislike so much, but have an intense fear that something may go wrong. And yet, my backpack continues to fill with the new artefacts I excavate while I traverse the land and sky and heaven and sea on a wispy cloud of words. I love to collect concoctions of phrases and explosive potions of expressions: fumbling and thumbing through syllables that stain like paint powder on the page: a colour run of ideas that dazzle under their newness. I write because these newborn words make me excited, make me feel something big.

I write to understand.

Sometimes I feel like my brain is too small, and other times too big, and only echoes one thought around and around and around and around. It’s a colour explosion but this time the fireworks ricochet through my body, tugging at any flesh that stands and coats it all with inescapable, putrid tar, claustrophobic and uncomfortable: I want to escape myself because I am stuck with myself. The words that fly across violin strings onto paper give an articulation to the squiggles that coil and knot around my brain like too many silken strings for one marionette. I write because I am blinded by hot bursts of feelings that span from foreign compositions to plain English, capitalised and furious. I write because my emotional energy is too much, too plain, too strong to merely wrap up in newspaper and read some other time in some other life.

I write because I love to feel and explore and because I am bad at drawing.

Kaleidoscope Jar (My Favourite Things) POEM

Someone, a long time ago, gifted me a jar,

whose glass could not be pierced or shattered,

and a rim that could expand indefinitely

to fit all of my most treasured things in:

The sweetened scent of vanilla from its cocoon

that curls from a candle in a closed room;

the barely audible crackles from its wick

reminiscent of early evenings in winter

The soft, safe smudge just above a cat’s paw pad

and nestled behind little pink toes, like beans;

that delicious velvet space uncoiling in the sun

- whose golden wrath dusts along exposed collarbones

Those minute moments in old film photography,

where hazy colours pop black patches fragmentally,

And everyone captured extends their carefree grins

knowing these memories will not be rose-tinted

Deep brown pinstripes that embalm griddled Greek cheese

- singing alongside charring vegetables -

Like Mediterranean ventures in the summers’ peak

Where any corner turned would present a postcard scene

That warm sensation, like pouring brewed tea into you blood;

inescapable jitters that come with this caffeine rush

when your eyes lay upon the harmonious freckles

that patter upon the cheeks of the person that you love

Someone, a long time ago, gifted me a jar,

which cradles all of my most treasured things

And when, sometimes, the sky is washed with grey

I open the jar to allow a kaleidoscope to escape.

110 Above 2018 review - Go over to Last Creative UK!

At the beginning of August, I went back to my favourite festival, 110 Above. And I wrote about it for the music blog, Last Creative UK. And you should check it out, right here: https://www.lastcreative.co.uk/blog/110abovereview

Here is a little snippet of what I wrote, including my thoughts on my favourite band (can you guess?)

110 Above: a three day weekend that transforms an unassuming farm nestled down a dirt road in Leicester, into a vibrant, fun festival, filled to the brim with incredible music. And, though I had doubts it could get any better than last year, I was happily mistaken, as not only this year’s line up, but the atmosphere – and weather – topped the event as the best one yet!

***

If there is ever a conversation about music and I am involved, Marsicans are the band that will inevitably come up: I became – marginally – obsessed after seeing them at 110 Above last year, with their feel-good bops, M&M’s style of dress and the fun they exude on stage. And, I was more than excited when they were one of the first acts to be announced to be playing this year once again (it is actually their third consecutive time playing the festival). So, twenty minutes early (embarrassingly, for my friend Emily, who waited with me through sound check, just so we could get to the front) we flocked to the main stage, ready to be greeted by the self-described ‘indie meets dirty pop’ tunes.

And, as predicted, the colourful band delivered: right at the front, I danced and sang to all the words to their newest and most known music, including ‘Swimming’, ‘Friends’, and ‘Too Good’ (my favourite!) as well as the newly released ‘Pop-Ups’ and ‘Throw Ourselves In’. They also introduced their new song, ‘Suburbs’, in keeping with the upbeat riffs and harmonies of their previous songs – keep an eye out for when this comes out! ‘Absence’, an emotionally-engrained song for anyone in a long distance relationship of any kind, ended the energetic and grin-inducing set. And I was radiating for the rest of the day.

Bit of Marsicans fun

F A B

And if you want to read more, go have a boogie on over to Last Creative UK!

The Paddle Boarding Incident

For two weeks in July, I volunteered for the incredible Wildlife Sense, an organisation in Kefalonia set up for the conservation of turtles. And last week I put up a blog post all about my time there. (https://helenaquainton.blogspot.com/2018/08/wildlife-sense-my-time-with-turtles-and.html)

However, there was an afternoon I had there that I somehow forgot to write about, so I wanted to share it in its own post. This is The Paddle Boarding Incident.

The unsuspecting eight-man paddle board

With only three days left until we were all bound to leave our Lixouri camp (#oneteamonedream) the suggestion of paddle boarding at Lepada beach sounded like not only a fun way to fill our afternoon, but also provide some well-cherished memories between the group, before we all came back home. So, with our bikinis and swim shorts layered under our clothing, we trekked off down the road under the mid-afternoon sun.

The eight-man paddleboard, floating on the ridiculously clear teal water, awaited us as we slathered on sun cream and clipped ourselves into life jackets (very fetching, I know). We then had the task of actually getting on the thing, which involved a grand leap – and a hope our swimming bottoms didn’t come down with it!

As someone who has danced for the majority of their life, I thought my balance would be relatively sound. This assumption was completely pulled from underneath me – and this felt very literal – as I was stumbling atop the board like Bambi finding his legs. Once we had the huge oars in our hands, the violent shaking of my legs improved slightly – until people started getting pushed in by other members for fun. Luckily, my demeanour continued to embody that of a baby deer, so I was probably pitied and left on the board.

Soon, we were – in a diagonal sort of way – travelling down the ‘passage’, the stream of the sea that would lead us into a bigger part of the sea, which sits in between Lixouri and Argostoli: you can spot Argostoli’s lighthouse and abandoned hotel from the shoreline of Lixouri, and is about a twenty minute ferry ride between the two areas of Kefalonia.

This is where, on reflection, things started to go downhill: we decided to sit down. It was a unanimous decision to just enjoy our setting and have a chat and paddle, sitting down instead of wavering about on our feet. Even though it was an eight-man board, the six of us were still quite squeezed on, and sitting down did not help the matter. But, it was tranquil, as well as entertaining, to perch virtually atop the water, with the beautiful Kefalonian backdrop encompassing us.

What we were unaware of is that we had drifted. Quite far. So far in fact that when we decided to paddle back, we realised our paddling made no difference: although we weren’t going the wrong way, we weren’t going the right way either and just remained where we were, occasionally spinning in a circle in an attempt to work out which way each of us should paddle. We had hit The Paddle Boarding Incident.

Luckily, I think I was the only one of the group to express an excessive ‘panicker’ gene, so everyone remained relatively calm. (While in my head streams of classics, such as “are we going to get back within the hour we bought?” and “will we actually make it back at all?” and “what happens if I fall in and as I haul myself back on the board, my bikini bottoms fall off?” spiralled around and around.) We were considerably close to Argostoli and were not getting any closer to Lixouri, its beach now just a faint paint stroke.

Our stint on the water was only for an hour, but to try and paddle ourselves back would have taken at least two – unless we had given up, which was more likely, and then who knows how long.

And then our saviour came in a small, loud, bright and embarrassing shape of a speedboat.

“Are they coming to rescue us?”

“I think they are.”

We were so completely badat paddle boarding that a lifeguard had been dispatched to save us from potentially drifting out into the open sea. (We maintained we were simply going to visit Argostoli.)

So, begrudgingly, we all had to clamber on this tiny, telephone-box-red boat – all six of us – and be towed back to the shore, with the paddleboard flapping behind us.

“Does this happen a lot? You having to come and rescue people?” we asked the lifeguard, taking a gap year he said, so probably about 18 and therefore younger than any of us by at least a year.

“To beginners, yeah.”

Huh. We looked like complete amateurs even to strangers. Who knew?

We stumbled safely to shore, tossed off our life jackets – then respectfully hung them back up in their hut – and agreed that next time, solo paddle boarding may be a better option than the eight-man fiasco, which caused The Paddle Boarding incident.

Wildlife Sense: My Time With Turtles and So Much More

If I could describe the feeling of utter ecstasy and excitement at seeing a baby turtle scramble down our handmade trench to the big blue sea, I could only liken it to what I imagine sending your child off to university feels like. And in my two weeks with Wildlife Sense’ Lixouri camp, I have avalanched from liking turtles to simply adoring them.

Sneaky peak of what's to come: lots of cute bubba turts!

I discovered Wildlife Sense a few years back, while on an early - for holiday standards - walk along a beach in Skala, Kefalonia (because my mum wanted to take pictures of the views). While stumbling over the weightless sand, we noticed people, adorned with clipboards and turquoise t-shirts, counting long snaking lines to the sea. When we ambled over, the group showed us the tracks –turtle tracks!- running intermittently down the beach; their role, as volunteers, was to check the nests and tracks and aid baby turtles that may have been weak or became disorientated during their hatching.
And there I was instantly sold: I signed up too.

Baby turtle tracks

Off to the sea

My cousin Emily (my travelling companion, from such tales as New York and 110 Above) and I landed in Kefalonia on 17th July, mildly agitated by the hour and half delay due to freak fog, tired from the travel, and filled with anticipation: we had made it. Here was to the next two weeks filled with turtles!

We were escorted and ferried by other Wildlife Sense members, Izi (half of our field assistant duo in Lixouri) and Annya, and led to where we would be spending our time for a fortnight, in a rented house containing six other volunteers just like us, and Harry our leader. As soon as our rucksacks touched our bunk beds, Izi had whipped out her laptop and began reeling through our welcome presentation: our delay had meant we had missed this, performed to the whole group - however we did not miss out on our souvlaki (dubbed, by me, as Wildlife Sense’s version of McDonald’s: just around the corner, cheap and our treat each week, as well as containing not only pitta but chips inside the pitta. Incredible). And this is where Izi casually dropped the “now we’ve thrown you two into the deep end a bit” remark. And, at nearly midnight, our ‘deep end’ would be waking up at 5am the next day - which was rapidly approaching - for our first Morning Survey. We were in bed as soon as she closed the door goodnight.

Morning Surveys and Hatchling Rescues were our typical shifts in saving turts; due to the time of year, nesting season was decreasing and the actual hatchlings were hatching in successive abundance. With rucksacks rammed like Mary Poppin’s hold-all, we would travel by bike or by foot to a beach location (containing more than one beach) and patrol the sands for mum or baby turtle tracks and disturbances to the nests too. Everything we saw and found would have to be meticulously scribed and photographed, from the time we entered the beach, to GPS points and sketches of the arches and curls that a mother turtle made in the sand, trying to find the perfect spot for her clutch of eggs. 

Me, on a Morning Survey

On our very first Morning Survey, our leader and Field Assistant Izi saw some particularly ridged tracks from a turtle and when we followed them up the sandy waves like a treasure map trail, we came across our first nest! On our hands and knees, we slowly scooped sand away from the suspected egg chamber then, hitting wet sand, we did the ‘drop test’: if a finger goes through the wet sand easily like a drop, there would be precious eggs underneath. Finding this drop point, Izi carefully excavated until the tops of white shells emerged: it felt like Easter, only these were real eggs and not chocolate (and much more exciting too). I remember I was so enthralled I could not help but squeal a little at the thought that baby turtles were just right there. (I tell you, these turtles really draw you in - I’m obsessed now.)

Our first nest! There are eggs in there!

And night-time Hatchling Rescue was just as thrilling: sleeping bags laid out on the beach, we would sleep right by a nest, together under the clear, white stars. Every hour, one of the pair would wake up and scan the nest, illuminating it up with red-light torches, to check for emerging turts. And, although it was exhausting and sometimes a bit cold (ignoring the part on the packing list about bringing a hoodie was the mistake here) to be able to talk late into the night, sleep on the sand and know you are helping out these little babies only meters away from you was amazing. Although I did not see any bubby turts on Hatchling Rescue, I did have the chance on the Inventories.

An Inventory, with Harry and Emily. Our second to last day and we got 6 baby turtles!

Sleeping next to a nest began on Day 45 (the amount of days after the eggs were laid) but nearing Day 60, worries about the survival rate and hatchling outcome became apparent. Lixouri’s camp leader, Harry (the most enthusiastic and excitable man I’ve ever seen, and all about turtles) decided to check on nest LP1, as there were mounting concerns that none of the babies had popped out yet. With rubber gloves and buckets (ready for survivors), we all watched intently as Harry brushed sand away from the nest’s centre, as Izi had done before on our Morning Survey but more solemnly. And that became apparent when he announced “dead within”, cradling a tiny baby turtle in the fingers, dead. And then another dead. And another. Soon, several rows of tiny, motionless turtles lay next to the nest. In that moment, I thought I could cry. The atmosphere had become stagnant with sadness but was suddenly pierced when Harry exclaimed “alive within!” A scrabbling baby turtle, wiggling his flippers like he was swimming through the sky, was placed in the bucket, where he subsequently tried to escape. He was a strong one, and I felt even more elated as we watched him gallivant (as fast as a baby turtle can) down our trench runway, ready to take off into the water. He swam perfectly; his little black head poking up for air eventually became fainter and fainter until we couldn’t see him any more. I felt like I had seen my child off into his new life.

My first ever baby turtle! (Or tittle as Emily believes they should be called)

In the end, I observed three Inventories, with one releasing forty turtles into the sea, all while an eclipse was mulling in the night sky. As Josh peeled away the top layer of sand, five tiny turtles were sticking their head and front flippers out of the sand like sunflowers, and all lit up by the peeling moon.

Baby turtles coming out of the nest

But it wasn’t just baby turts we aided, as we took the ferry to Argostoli on the first Friday, to perform health checks on the adult turtles in its harbour. Just strolling along the harbour, you could observe the gliding, green shapes of turtles, waiting for entrails to be thrown over the side of the little fishing boats bobbing atop the teal sea. However, we were soon not just admiring them from afar, but right under our fingertips: Harry, in his wetsuit, would spot a turtle and hold onto it (I know it wasn’t a fun piggy-back, but I was slightly jealous that the fantasy of riding on a turtle’s shell could not be mine) until it was safe for it to be lifted out of the water and onto the mats we had laid out on the side of the harbour. (Just a note: turtles can remain out of water for hours, and with multiple volunteers shading them from the sun, they were perfectly safe!) With a scribe’s pen at the ready, the health checks commenced: scanning for a tag, picking pesky hermits from the carapace (top of the shell), take multiple measurements. All the turtles we checked had been tagged before – which meant they all had names (Emily and I had thought of names beforehand, just in case there was an untagged turt. Mine would have been Gloria, and Emily’s Tenniel – I said Gloria and Tenniel sounded like the coolest lesbian couple ever, and this subsequently became our quiz name and alter egos) and some were very dear to the volunteer’s hearts, such as Danielle, the largest turtle I had ever seen.

Danielle, who we spotted later on in Argostoli harbour: could have found her anywhere!

Yet, it was Jane that made the biggest impression, because she had been previously injured: a thick, flesh-pink welt down to the bone of her skull covered the top of her head, an injury probably caused by a boat strike. After cleaning out the wound, the decision was made by Chanel (the big boss of Wildlife Sense, along with her husband, Nikos) to transport Jane to the vets. So that simply meant that Jane had to go in the boot of a car with Harry tending to her the whole way. I would have loved to see passengers’ expressions in traffic at seeing a man crouching in the boot of a car, over a huge turtle, wrapped in towels.

And, finally, our rota contained chores and jobs to aid the running of the project: bike maintenance (Emily broke a bike’s brake within ten seconds of handling it; I believe she is now a record holder), data entry, beach profiling, light pollution surveys and cooking. I have never cooked for more than five people before, so to cook for ten plus (as leftovers for the next day’s lunch were always welcome) seemed rather daunting. If you have met me for even less than ten minutes – maybe five, depending on my mood – you would know I get very easily stressed out: “I’m stressed” and “ouch!” (because I attracted a lot of injuries while in Kefalonia) were my buzzwords over the two weeks. Would there be enough food? Would people like the meal? Would people hate the meal and not tell me? Would people hate the meal and tell me? “You’re a perfectionist,” Harry said, and it’s true, because I was stressed for the whole duration of the first meal I had to cook. And yet, being in the kitchen and cooking – at least when the gas didn’t turn itself off, just as we were about to put the spaghetti on to boil – were some of my fondest moments while at Wildlife Sense, aside from the turtles, of course. With Harry or Josh’s playlist swirling from a speaker, we would sing and dance and laugh and coo about the turtles we had seen and discuss our lives back home. The communal kitchen at first terrified me, as I did not know what to say or what to do, but by the end, I was in there for a good portion of my free time – probably annoyingly for the people who wanted a break from me! – either talking, reading, or debating what to draw on my scoot (section of a turtle’s carapace) for our group’s joint turtle artwork. And that was all made possible because of the friendly, interesting, downright hilarious volunteers who I had the privilege to work with: Harry, Izi, Josh, Charlotte, El, Laura-Li, Olivia, Rebecca, Sarah and Emily (of course!) thank you for the best time. From praising my admittedly pitiful cycling attempts (I did not realise how many hills there were in Lixouri, and how much thigh chaffing I would gather either), to inspiring conversations and debates while patrolling the beaches at both 10pm and 6am, showing me the joys of henna (I need more!) and generally being such great people. You guys rock. (#teamlixouri #oneteamonedream)

The turtle kids

Dinner time

And a cheesy grin!

And before I knew it, the two weeks were over. As Emily and I arrived into Kefalonia, we saw a girl leaving Wildlife Sense’s Argostoli camp, to fly back home to Toronto, Canada. When she saw us, she asked how long we were staying for. “Ah two weeks? It’s never enough!” At the time, I thought two weeks wasa long time, however now I would happily have done the month if not longer if I could. As we waved Lixouri goodbye while on the ferry back to Argostoli, where our plane awaited for us to fly back to England, I could have imploded with sadness of leaving such an incredible place. Jokingly, earlier in the week, Olivia had said “don’t laugh because it’s over, smile because it happened” (to which we all groaned, including Liv herself, at the sheer cheesiness of it) but in a way – and with a shudder – in this instance I have to agree: my time in Kefalonia for Wildlife Sense was amazing, incredible, definitely life changing and great fun. It has increased my confidence when talking to new people (a struggle of mine), experience time away from home and prove that I can take care of myself (a mantra I believed I could not claim), as well as develop a real passion for conservation work and turtles too. And that is why, as I was on the ferry back to Argostoli, with the wild whiling up my hair and the sun warming my newly-tanned skin (very proud of that), I decided I wanted to volunteer again next year (fingers crossed!).

Last load of turtles off to the sea - and every one of them made it!

Wildlife Sense, thank you so much for this wonderful experience, and I hope to see you (and maybe some of my fellow volunteers) very soon!

Wildlife Sense, we love you and your turts

Powerful Women - poem

I may be just one timid soul

among the plentiful sheep.

But a herd may overrun

a shepherd who chooses to maltreat.

What if we are lead into doubt

about how we should present

our bodies, that we are ashamed of?

And not through our own consent.

Like the forgivable moon

or the thinness of the reeds,

we should be proud of our nature

and ignore those who impede.

Because my body doth offend you?

Well, listen awful well:

there’s a reason we’re here today

and it’s not for you to tell

when we’re permitted to show flesh

if it doesn’t correspond with ‘ideal’

I think we can decide ourselves

what will consist of our next meal.

Do you think we’re here to look at?

Arranged to file one after each.

Well, my face is not unsymmetrical

for your cosmetics to breach.

In fact, shove your beauty standards

where the bleaching is still performed.

I’m tired of staying in lipstick lines

of society’s laws that we still conform.

I can decide when my lashes flicker

We are powerful women

Catcalls shouldn’t make us walk quicker

We are powerful women

I am rising from cultural conformity,

to fulfil my hand-tailored destiny.

Climbing social ladders as elevators

We are powerful women

Beauty winks in our very pores

We are powerful women

Obey your own style instead of flaws;

continue to smile at reflections because

We are powerful women.

We are powerful women.

We are. Powerful women.

Inspired by an incredible poem by Maya Angelou, called 'Still I Rise'