Moving to another country, or even to another city, can be an exciting (and stressful) experience. Goldsmiths MA student Sofia Wickerhauser interviews fellow Goldsmiths’ students about the things they brought with them from home.
Suzanne Hayes brought something from her home in New York on a friends advice: “She told me to bring a mug from home just so I had something familiar… It’s a mug my mom gave me that says, “the evil sister”, but I also bought myself a mug at Anthropologie for my birthday that looks like subway tiles that I use more than the other. The subway tiles remind me of New York, so it’s become my favourite mug.”
Emma-Jane Betts brought books, movies and necklaces that were presents from her parents in Johannesburg: “I also insisted on bringing some shells and wire figures from South Africa with me. I wanted my room to show where I was from to the people at uni, and [for] it to feel more like home in the UK… The wire figures are beaded, and look like animals, which people love.”
Amna, a student from Doha, says that books were always her best friend: “I couldn’t bear to part with them, so I brought as many as I could” – Anne Frank’s ‘The Diary of a Young Girl’ is her favourite.
Luca van Bambost has a similar passion for books: “I brought a book with three short stories [by] Dutch writer Nescio with me. After living in Amsterdam for five years, they remind me of my time over there. The stories all follow characters from Amsterdam struggling to find their place in a changing society… The romantic characters in Nescio’s books remind me of my friends back home.”
But it’s not only international students who feel the need to bring a taste of home with them when moving to London. Elliot Wedge Barker, a student from York, wanted to bring a memory from their city: “The day I moved away from York I went to the local market and bought a jar of honey that had been produced near the city as a way of remembering the environment I came from. I got through it quite quickly, but it was a nice thing to transition to living in London with.”
Harry Nott moved his entire film collection from Pontefract to London– more than 300 movies: “It’s a big collection ranging from obscure arthouse to blockbusters. I can’t live with the idea [of going] the effort to find a copy of something, when I could just have it all here. My favourite movie is Apocalypse Now.”
For more information about Goldsmiths’ student halls, visit the Accommodation page on the Goldsmiths website.