When I came to Oxford I had just turned 18 and I had only ever lived in Asia. Here are some things I think would benefit me greatly.
Some resources
- The Oxford Tube is a bus that comes every 15 minutes and takes you to and from London. It is 1-2 hours slower than the train, but £10-15 cheaper.
- The Airline bus takes you to and from Gatwick/Heathrow. It is around the same price as the train, but again it takes you a lot closer to your college.
- Register with your GP ASAP and have a very low bar of scheduling an appointment.
To bring
- I would recommend not bringing a lot from home, e.g. kitchen materials, bike stuff, especially if you are an international student, you have no family in the UK to help, or you are disabled. Moving in/out is extremely tiring and stressful, and Oxford has many cobblestone roads and stairs. You also probably won’t need a lot of stuff.
- At ChCh, you are allowed 2 boxes and 1 suitcase of vacation storage. This was often not enough for me (because I brought too much stuff with me to the UK) and made moving out super stressful because everything wouldn’t fit.
- You can buy most of the stuff you need at Oxford.
- You might want to disregard my advice if you are financially constrained, and stuff from your home is cheaper than Oxford. There also might be special culinary sauces/medicines that you can’t get in the UK.
- Some things that greatly increased my quality of life:
- A rice cooker and an air fryer. ChCh does not have a kitchen and does not allow you to cook, at least for first year accommodation. Having these saved me a lot of time and money.
- A thick blanket and a thin blanket (bonus points if you can zip those two blankets together). Oxford gets super cold in the winter, but during Trinity it surprisingly gets super hot.
- At some colleges, the heating in the winter turns off at 10pm and starts at 6-7am ish. Which is crazy. Those are the key heating hours!! Most rooms also doesn’t have AC in the summer.
Things to get
- Get a crappy bike (uner £80) during Fresher week bike sales (often discounted for students). Don’t get a good bike, because anything new looking will be stolen immediately. A bike will greatly increase your productivity and save you a lot of time.
- Get a 3 year railcard. The train is pretty good in the UK, especially if you are travelling to/from the airport, London, etc.
- Keeping a medicine bag with miscellaneous things. Since Boots and supermarkets close early, and GPs are hard to reach, you’ll need medicine random things for when you get hurt or sick.
- Don’t get an Oxford Union membership.
- You might want to get a Union membership for the debates (like I did). In my opinion, the debates aren’t usually fruitful discussions where people try to interpret each other charitably and critically (like how you might write a pol/phil essay). They feel like a performance (people screaming and walking out, burning newspapers, etc).
- I think that it is a much better use of your time to study for your degree, network/socialise with peers, or to get some good rest.
- You might want to get involved in Union politics. I feel very strongly against this because the Oxford Union is becoming increasingly conservative and authoritarian, platforming right-wing radical speakers like Charlie Kirk, refusing to fly the Pride flag during Pride month, and handling the Israel-Palestine debate extremely poorly. These are all causes that I care very much about, and I don’t think that you should be paying money or participating in an institution like that.
- You can meet celebrities who come to the Union by going along with someone who has a Union membership.
Advice you should take with a grain of salt
- Don’t be too stressed about finding friends!
- I was really scared that I wouldn’t find my best friend or have a friend group at Oxford. I realised that optimising/aiming for the goal of finding friends often leaves you with less good friends, since you might present yourself inauthentically, get FOMO, or compromise your boundaries.
- I ended up with so many meaningful and fulfilling friendships, but I would have been equally fine having no friends at all compared.
- Along the same vein, don’t be stressed about “doing things the right way”.
- I think it is more important to explore and figure out what you think is important and what you want to work towards. I think I actually wasted time going to a bunch of finance networking events and attending spring weeks.
- Prioritise health over everything else. I wish I had gone to the GP for my condition earlier and prioritised my sleep more.
- Find your One Thing. Having at least one thing that you do consistently and comes with a community you can be part of is something I would greatly recommend, since the university is very big and dispersed.