Can’t believe it’s over? Here’s how to cope.
Photo via the University of Victoria.
It was only on my last day of classes a few weeks ago when I realized how many things I have yet to do at UVic.
After many years of study here, you might assume that you’ve already explored every square inch of our middle-sized university. But, as we inevitably fall into the routine of classes, it’s easy to get caught up in the hustle and bustle of schoolwork and forget the many quirks of our lovely campus.
I have a feeling that when my actual final exam is complete in a few days, I will be wandering aimlessly around campus, hit with the shock that I’m no longer a UVic student.
Below is a list of activities I have compiled that I think everyone should do at least once before graduation, in the hope that my fellow sentimental graduates will have something to do in the next few months other than sit and stare at a wall.
Complete a full loop of Ring Road
I can recall being quite excited to attend university on a campus where everything revolves around a perfect, circular road. I owe it to my 17-year-old self to fulfill her dreams and walk around the ring in its entirety. Yes, I have probably walked all of its sections at different times throughout my degree, but I feel it necessary to complete one circumnavigation in order to appreciate it properly.
Experience a new building
Unless you have a degree in everything, it’s likely that you haven’t been inside every academic building on campus. I suggest exploring a building that’s new to you, to see what it might have looked like if you ended up getting a degree in biology instead of philosophy, or art history instead of astrophysics.
If you still have exams, perhaps you could even study in one of these unfamiliar spaces to shake things up.
Dip your feet in Petch Fountain
I can’t fully recommend this, since no one is quite sure what’s in that water, but if you feel brave, then try it out! What better way of connecting with campus than becoming one with UVic’s iconic fountain? After all, some of your tuition has gone towards its upkeep. When you eventually relive your university days, don’t you want to tell the people in your retirement home that you once dipped a toe in that famously murky water?
Walk past your first-year dorm
This one is a risky endeavour — not because it’s forbidden, but because only you know what it might do to your mental state. Like most people, I have never again set foot on the concrete courtyard below my dorm building, but this might be the perfect time.
Bonus points if you retrace your steps from your building to the parking lot where the infamous MOD dining portable once stood, all while listening to the same music your new friends introduced you to in first year.
See campus from a new perspective atop Pkaals
Pkaals, sometimes referred to using its colonial name of Mount Tolmie, is the perfect place to look at UVic from above. It’s only a ten minute climb from the south-west corner of campus, and there’s no better spot nearby to look down at the place where you spent the last few years.
It can be tough to identify buildings at first, but once you do, you’ll wish you had time to get up there sooner. If you’re leaving Victoria to start a new chapter of your life, be sure to take in the view of this little peninsula you’ve come to call home before you say goodbye.
