e2 #275

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Editor: Tori Halman living@ epigram.org.uk

Deputy: Deputy: Sophia Hadjipateras Izzy Kerr shadjipateras@ ikerr@ epigram.org.uk epigram.org.uk

Online: Morwenna Scott livingonline@ epigram.org.uk

The Hot New Break-up Trend: ‘Conscious Uncoupling’

Living

‘Conscious uncoupling’ does sound like a nice notion to attempt, especially for the sake of children (if the uncoupling couple have any). If one has taken a decade of one’s life to know someone so intimately and that you both ended up procreating - a tantalising fusion of heart and soul and DNA -of course one would hope that it doesn’t all end in silence, violence or voodoo. No one wants that. And so ‘conscious uncoupling’ fills a void; when alternative people want to do something differently, there is a void. Why have milk when you can have almond milk, shoes when you can have hemp shoes with bicycle-tyre soles, meat when you can have a whole shelf of bottled seed-oil supplements, divorce when you can have…?

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“Maybe they only had an affair because you embedded pubic hair into the soap every frigging day”

Conscious uncoupling’ seems to be a hot topic.

News of Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin’s ‘new-age’ divorce is splashed across almost every newspaper and blog. “So who cares and why should I?” I hear you ask, eyebrows raised in mild exasperation. Well, perhaps ‘conscious uncoupling’ can teach us all a thing or two - whether it’s insightful relationship advice or merely confirmation that celebrities are real people, susceptible to all the fads and fashions (and breakups) that normal people are, I leave it to you to decide.

About a month ago, Paltrow first broke the news of the split via her website Goop.com, and confused her fans by her unusual phrase. It is likely that ‘conscious uncoupling’ is in fact a clever media ploy, so rather than the usual berating that celebrities enjoy when their personal lives cease to be the fairy-tale dream we expect of them, Gwyneth and Chris get accused only of pompous magniloquence.

So what is ‘conscious uncoupling’? Basically, it involves looking inside oneself and reflecting on the part one played in the dissolution of the couple, rather than the spiteful, bitter blaming of the other that divorce

too-often entails. Now, it may be easy to scoff and dismiss such airy-fairy hot air as pretentious puffery – “our divorce is different, we don’t hate each other, we’re great mates and will continue to co-parent our children like adults” – when actually they’re seething inside, bubbling cauldrons of bile and spit, with voodoo dolls of each other under their pillows; pins in eyes and genitals. However, there’s something to be said for keeping all that hateful anguish bottled up inside and directing it at yourself instead of your ex, so you appear calm and collected to the public eye of Sauron.

In all seriousness, self-reflection shouldn’t really be spat on.

Relationships usually involve two people, and even if one’s partner has a murky affair with your neighbour’s daughter’s best friend, maybe a quick peek into the mirror wouldn’t do any harm. Maybe they only had an affair because you meticulously arranged the spice rack reverse-alphabetically, or embedded pubic hair into the soap EVERY FRIGGING DAY, or put everything in ‘safe places’ to such a degree that car keys are found in plant pots, and vibrating cock rings are discovered in the slavering jowls of your neighbour’s dog, silk pantyhose strewn over the lawn… until the last straw has been obliterated.

Having said this, I applaud Paltrow and Martin for attempting to diverge from the clichéd painful divorce. Of course ‘conscious uncoupling’ will still be painful: all those voodoo doll pins aren’t really malicious stabs, but a kind of futile middle finger at your un-partner for making you feel so wretchedly dejected and empty; they’re just pins of selfdefence, a pretence that you don’t rock yourself to sleep every night in your massive double bed. It is definitely possible to be on good terms with an ex-lover, although it can be difficult to renounce familiar patterns of behaviour. ‘Uncoupling’ could simply mean an undoing of all the couple-y things previously done. It could mean slowly learning not to stroke someone’s hair out of their eyes in that intimate way, walking down the street without fondling that stretch of skin between the other’s index finger and thumb - just putting up a little fence around your personal space. Separating doesn’t mean you have to spend time with your kids separately, move to a different city, or pretend not to notice that Sainsbury’s has buy-one-get-one-free Organic Honey-Roasted Hazelnut and Toasted Oat Granola, your un-couple’s favourite. Instead you could phone them and tell them the good news! Boy, you could even bring them breakfast! (But not in bed, remember, not in bed...)

Maybe it’s idealistic to hope that all separating couples can do so ‘consciously’ and take some responsibility for the split, but it can only be a good thing that an alternative to straightup divorce is being publicised (even if it is just a cover-up and in reality it was all Chris’ fault because he went and slept with Angelina Jolie, that scumbag).

Izzy Burnett

e2 wants you!

The last hurrah. The final goodbye. The end of an era. It’s time for the last edition of e2 this year where, appropriately, the theme is ‘full stop’.

Do you fancy editing e2 next year?

Whether you’re leaving Bristol for good this year, or if you’ve got another year or few left, let e2 show you the best way to celebrate the end of this year.

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Finally, thank-you from all of the e2 team to you, our dear readers, for your love, attention and for picking us up every fortnight. See you next year! love, e2 xx

Thanks for reading e2 and have a great summer!

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12.05.2014

Room 101:

The Big Bad World realisation dawns upon me. This is not the worst year of my life. It’s the last of the best.

Real life is a place where downing a Jagerbomb in under 30 seconds isn’t a valid achievement for the CV. In real life an example of working successfully in a team wasn’t that time I wingmanned my friend with that hot guy and good communication skills definitely aren’t how well you can drunk text. Which is a shame really as I have honed all these strengths to near enough perfection.

Non-student life sees the end of many things, namely happiness of any kind. Say goodbye to your student loan, being paid to literally do nothing, while student discounts are also a thing of the past. Midweek drinking becomes socially frowned upon, as is my much loved daily routine of This Morning, followed by a nap, lunch, followed by a nap, waking up for Jeremy Kyle before a couple of Real Housewives episodes come on and fatigue takes over me once again

The term that isn’t really a term, more of a black abyss of exam and essay related hell, is here already and the end of the academic year is nigh. During this time of despair, dreams of festivals, summer travel plans or just excitement to go home may be in the air for some of you. But for me, and a big shout out to those other final years suffering out there, this means only one thing. University, and student life as we know it, is over forever.

Let me take you on a little journey through time.

For me, it seems like only yesterday I was cruising down the M4 for the first time, my face squished to a crack in the window in a desperate attempt to breathe after insisting that I bring everything I have ever owned in the entirety of my life to my new home. Fresh-faced and armed with a tin of Celebrations to bribe my Durdham Hall flatmates to like me (it worked), I had arrived.

First year went by in a vodka-fuelled blur of Bunker Mondays… and Wednesdays… and the odd Friday, with a sprinkling of crippling hangover, a dash of daytime TV and a spoonful of awkward new friends. I lived in a world where naps occurred more frequently than lectures. Where the most stressful life choice was whether to live in Clifton or Redland the following year. Where 40% was the new A*. This world, my friends, was good.

As your fortnightly bearer of bad news (why stop now?), you need to know that the rumours are true.

Third year is the worst year of your life. Everyone will tell you and no-one will quite grasp just how factual this is until their time comes. The debilitating fear that you will leave Uni thousands of pounds in debt, significantly more overweight than you started and with only a Desmond to your name is with you always. I’m unwillingly cheating on the relationship I once had with Lounge with the cruel mistress that is the ASS. I speak to my dissertation supervisor more than my flatmates and, more regular than the 16 (we called it the U6 in my day), there is a breakdown on the hour, every hour.

Yet, as I start to apply for real people jobs, a cruel

“I’m unwillingly cheating on the relationship I once had with Lounge with the cruel mistress that is the ASS” . I’m having to swap my vast array of onesies for restrictive office wear and come to terms with the fact 3 month summers off are no longer a thing. Just as I’m acquiring that unique Sainsbury’s Basics Table Wine taste, it is being cruelly ripped away from me. As you find yourself homeless, moving back in with your family is an unfortunate necessity and my parents have even mentioned ME paying THEM for this horrific ordeal. Rent, they called it. As if.

So please as you start to stress about upcoming exams or commence those allnighters in the library, hating your course and questioning your life, take a step back; there is a very good reason why people say being a student are the best days of your life. I haven’t even started real life yet but I’m already 97% sure it is not for me. Not to fear though guys, I’ve done what any rational, real world adult would do in this scenario. Undertaken an extensive and exhaustive check over the UCAS website for my next degree. Travel and Tourism at Brighton? Say hello to your new fresher.

Laura Burridge

Francesca Lynagh gives an insight as to why the “real world” is neither big nor bad...

Exam season is nearly upon us, there’s no denying that, and as we sit sharpening our elbows ready for the 7am scram to secure a library seat, I can’t help but feel that, realistically, it’s a bit late for final years to ‘make the most’ of their time left as a student. Once we

finally emerge from our festering revision lairs, filled with coffee stained mugs and post-it note splattered walls, student life will be ending, and we will soon be thrust into the real world, which is, for most of us, a terrifying prospect.

The question is: will leaving Uni

be as bad as we think? There will certainly be aspects of student life that we might crave in the future; snoozing until midday, student loans, spontaneous midweek boozing sessions, but must it all be doom and gloom post-Bristol?

To help me answer this question I called upon the opinion of my Bristol University alumni friend, who has made the leap into the dark-side, aka ‘real life’. Her remarkably optimistic attitude with regards to life in the unknown was encouraging - particularly her statement, ‘When the time came I was ready to leave Uni’. It’s true, deadline after deadline does become tiring and monotonous,

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things to look foward to postFreshers

You won’t be woken up every night at 3am by a fire alarm.

Having to decide between being poor and warm or cold and rich.

Say goodbye to those best friends you made in halls, you may have been breakfast-buddies for the whole year, but now you’ll ignore them in the street.

The walk of shame just got a whole lot longer, and you’ll probably get lost.

You actually have to go to lectures now.

The stuff you learn counts, what even?

Flatline and Abode are satanic establishments and thieves.

When you get locked out no one is going to come and let you in until the morning.

Your neighbours might not be okay with you blasting music until 4am, so make friends with them. (Top tip: cakes always go down well).

You have to deal with bins. Snow or no snow. Hangover or no hangover.

Inter-house relationships. Avoid.

No more pre-drinks or meals in the corridors or on the bathroom floors.

Bristol’s wild and wonderful nightlife is on your doorstep - from houseparties to Lakota or The Cori Tap, it’s all a walk/crawl away. and it is sometimes easy to lose momentum and/or the will to live, especially by the time third year hits. Students often have to create the routine that sporadic timetables do not provide, or risk feeling like pointless members of society floating around Bristol. Some revel in this lack of structure, but others will relish having a true purpose to every day in the real world, at least Monday to Friday. Recognition for work undertaken, in the form of a salary, and not just a mark, is going to be a wonderful thing. I’m sure the working world will have its bad days, but think of it this way - a salary will allow for such things as heating and non-Sainsbury’s basics

goods. At least three years of our lives are spent working towards receiving that one piece of paper that renders us credible humans to the rest of the real world, and what a sense of achievement to finally receive it at graduation.

The oppressive institution that is the ASS library will never darken our days again, and we will finally be free of the Bristol bubble, in which everyone knows everyone else’s business. Yes, the real world beckons, a harsh but inevitable realisation, but sometimes you have just got to let go and, to once again quote my friend; ‘There are always the weekends….’

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THE STUDENT NOTEBOOK: Remember all those years ago, back when you were all basically still in your underpants, a bandana wearing girl sang about how ‘all good things come to an end’? Yes, unfortunately all good, and bad things usually come to an end. You finish university, break up with your beau and finish that last cookie in the jar. Is it bad that the cookie hurts me the most? But that memory – the initial ping or hook if you will – remains with you, so do things actually fully end?

Once a seed has been sown or something has been made known or a decision has been taken, that’s it. You can’t shove the cat back into the bag. Obviously, feelings die, experiences end and new things come along but that initial ping is always there, the memory. Every one of you will have experienced this in one way or another. Let’s take something you can all relate to, you’ve all had a good time on the Triangle right, be it the reptile lounge or the underground trench? Whether it resulted in finding what you thought would be your husband, making a new friend or just some dude/chick to ya know, those memories will always stay with you even though the experience obviously ends.

When on the brink of an important decision, I personally faff,

I to and fro, those close to me know I’m an indecisive imbecile. Heck, that person in the coffee queue knows I faff! However, it only takes one person – whatever they may mean to you, they could be an insignificant speck in the palette of your life or shape your world – to tell you to stop, breathe and live in the moment.

For all the good, bad and ugly – you gotta love the ugly – you shouldn’t want to give up any of it. With that mantra my friends, nothing ever technically ends because every moment merges into each other, teardrops into a pool leading into that big wide ocean if you will. (Or a more eloquent metaphor to a similar effect, I may be an English student but I’m an analyst not a poet).

It’s continuous so nothing ever needs to fully end, good or bad, it lives on in your noggin upstairs. For that, I thank this speck – as I’m sure you will thank your respective specks - for coming into my life, the faffing can stop and it’s not time for the new chapter but for part two. Cliché I know, but I had to go there for the big finish…

With that, fair Epigram readers I bid thee farewell.

Lots of love, Your ranting, ridiculous columnist.

Steph Rihon

Grammar Nazis There are a few reasons I don’t like the term Grammar Nazi.

The first reason – and perhaps the most obvious - is that I thinkit is probably a bit of an overreaction to compare the correction of a missing apostrophe to, say, the Final Solution. Secondly – and this will probably be a bit controversial – the defenders of grammar are only trying to do a good thing. Grammar/spelling/semantics, they’re all very important. A language without a grammatical code would be like driving down a road without any lines, road signs or traffic lights: a way of life bordering on anarchy. Before I go through the common mistakes that personally make me upset, I should clarify that I’m not searching for some purist utopia full of unsplit infinitives and the Oxford comma. No-body’s grammar is perfect (my disclaimer before you all inevitably correct mine in the comments section below). This is partly because the rules for grammar are open to interpretation and can be bent and twisted to supply endless hours of debate. This is a good thing though; bending the rules for satirical reasons or to create an appearance of informality is allowed. There are, however, some things that are just

plain wrong:

Your/You’re: This is

the worst of all sins.

‘Your’ is the possessive

adjective as in ‘your grammar is poor’. ‘You’re’ is the contraction of you are as in ‘you’re poor at grammar’. There are definitely harder things to grasp.

Genuinely/Generally: This is less grammar and more semantics, but as Werner Erhard said, ‘there are only two things in the world: nothing and semantics,’ so I shall continue. I’m not sure how this trend has come about but people seem to be using the two interchangeably, saying generally when they mean genuinely etc. If this sort of semantic conflation wasn’t bad enough, it gets worse. I don’t know if it is unique to her but I have a twin sister who seems to have fused the two; it has become a sort of ‘genuinerally’ that makes me flinch each time she says it. This kind of linguistic innovation is most unwelcome.

Apostrophes: An apostrophe is the difference between a business that knows its shit and a business that knows it’s shit.

That one’s for you, Waterstones.

You could call it pedantry but you can’t deny that having correct spelling or having correct grammar is important.

So, let the Grammar Nazis do their job; they’re only trying to help.

Emma Toogood

Revision ‘tips’: and the lies we’re told ...

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Listen to music: Classical music was said to improve your spatial memory. In reality, we flick from this to Rihanna and groove around the room. Whoops.

Highlighting: Oh yeah, I can pull out all the key items I need to learn in a handy, bright and cheerful way. No, wait, the whole page is pink.

Energy drinks and coffee: They seem great, you feel like a champion by your 5th cup. An hour later? Whatever goes up must come down.You’re asleep, or shaking uncontrollably.

Listening to notes in your sleep: Well, you’re asleep, so you’re not learning anything. That’s about it really.

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Revise with friends: Bouncing off each others ideas and stimulating intellectual discussion?

No. Gossip session, youtube vids and shit chat? Probably.

Cramming: No, your brain doesn’t actually work that well if you wait until the last 10 hours before the exam and try and remember everything you were taught over a year. Shocker.

Using mnemonics: It sounds like a clever technique, condensing all your facts into a smaller, bitesize arrangement of letters. Actually, remembering the shortened version is just as hard.

George Robb

Library Girl

I had a sushi session with my father a couple of weeks ago in London and, between mouthfuls of succulent sashimi, he imparted some advice: “Son”, he said wisely. “Before you apply for internships, remember to hermetically seal your Facebook. You don’t want employers to be deterred by that Brazilian prostitute outfit,

big enough? Is it even a thing to schweffe in the library? Are my muscles big enough?

All these questions, however, were subsumed by the big one: am I a man? To which I answered: yes, of sorts.

I bided my time like only the most skilful of hunters could and, at the opportune moment, let slip some wooing words in an affected baritone.

“Facebook vetting isn’t some unrealistic horror, it is a very real threat” however curvaceous it made your legs look.”

I dismissed his worries in a nonchalant fashion, gnawed on a California roll and travelled back to Bristol with my Facebook dangerously open.

A week later his prophecy was half realized. Employers weren’t deterred, but library girl was…

It was a sunny spring day,

the sort of weather that makes you want to strip down to your undies and writhe around in a paddling pool like a greased-up eel. I was in the library, reading Frank O’Hara, when a charming, Celtic blonde took the seat next to me.

Do I talk to her or abide by the library’s law of silence? Are my muscles big enough? If not, am I tensing them so that they appear

Summer diet? No, thanks

“Hey what’s up?” I said. “Do you, uh, mind guarding my stuff? I have a lecture.” Nailed it.

“No, sorry,” she said. “I’ve got one too.”

I returned from the lecture, moping heavily, and found her in the same place. As she went for a coffee break I used her absence to leave a note on her desk: “Even though you didn’t

determination to stick to a diet and feel comfortable in their own skin if dieting is what it takes, but I do have a problem with people constantly telling me that I have to do the same. I want to be able to make a conscious decision about my body and not feel guilty because yes, I did eat five cookies for lunch.

“Can someone please remind me why I have to change my body because of differentiating seasons?”

I’ve only been back in Bristol for a few days and I’ve already made my first, inexcusable error: I googled ‘how to get a summer body’.

340,000,000 results popped up, all suggesting I try the latest ‘7-day-diet’ or ‘summer-shapeup-meal plan’. Google was desperately trying to tell me why it is absolutely vital that I stick to whatever fabulous diet I choose for myself and how, while I apparently must look awful at the moment, I shouldn’t’ worry because if I don’t eat for a month I’ll suddenly look fine.

Great! What more could I possibly want than to suck all enjoyment out of my life?

You may have already noticed, but I’m not a ‘dieter’. Quite frankly, I was shocked; typical, boring feminist alert here, but can someone

please remind me why I have to change my body because of differentiating seasons?

Sure, I know I’m carrying a little ‘holiday’ weight (yes, it’s a backlog from Easter, but let’s be honest, it’s from Christmas and Easter the year before as well, so what?) but if I’m honest with you, summer sounds like as good a time as any to have an extra glass of Pimms or five. So why, during summer, the best season of them all, am I suddenly swamped with media telling me I must, at all costs, get thin?

I can’t be the only one to have noticed the sudden deluge of weight-focused articles and adverts. Don’t get me wrong, I respect someone a lot if they have the

And so, I thought I’d do the opposite, and convince you all that really, there’s just no need to get that supposed ‘beach bod’, no matter what Grazia tells you.

To start with a practical reason, we all have exams coming up. By all means, eat healthily during your exams, get that brain pumping with some extra vitamins, but don’t diet.

Why would you disrupt your body and make it the weakest it’s ever been, right when you need to be on your best form? That three-hour long exam won’t write itself, and you sure won’t be able to write it if all you’ve eaten is an apple and a lettuce leaf in the last three days.

Maybe you could try an alternative and hit the gym an extra time this

guard my stuff I still want to get a drink with you. 07528302792” (On a side note, if you’ve liked my column this term feel free to compliment me via SMS, MMS or Facetime.)

An hour later she texted me: “I got your note haha. [sic]” I replied: “So what do you say?”

“I think the note worked haha. What’s your name? [sic]” “What can I say, my prose must be very enchanting. My name is George Robb, what is yours?”

She never replied. According to an anonymous source who I went to great lengths to locate, it transpired that she Facebook stalked me, saw my freakish profile pictures and was thoroughly put off. I probably shouldn’t have used the term “enchanting prose” either.

I learnt something very important on that fateful day.

Facebook vetting isn’t some unrealistic horror story, it is a very real threat. Both chicas and employers alike reject you if your cyber personality is unattractive, and quite rightly so. Whilst I sit hear nursing my broken heart I implore you not to make the same mistake as I did.

week? Let’s face it, going to the gym will get you looking fit and healthier if that’s what you’re looking for, while also serving as a great break from the library during revision. Get those endorphins flowing and then head back to your books in a much better frame of mind.

After all, without wanting to discourage anyone, can you really do it? Most of these diets do not allow for alcohol consumption and let’s be honest, how on earth will you celebrate the end of exams if it’s not with a couple of Jaeger bombs?

Anyway, you look great as you are. I can’t even see you and I know it.And finally, Magnum ice cream are bringing new flavours out for the summer season. You can’t eat magnum ice creams if you’re on a diet, so it’s always best not to diet.

Lucy Stewart

Editor: Deputy: Online Olivia Lace-Evans Andrea Valentino Emilia Morano-Williams travel@ deputytravel@ travelonline@ epigram.org.uk epigram.org.uk epigram.org.uk

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Taking a return for the worst: how to deal with ‘end-of-holiday’ syndrome You can’t stop the inevitable. No matter how many new friends you have made, no matter how deep your tan is and no matter how many hangovers you have managed to conquer, every trip has an end. It doesn’t matter whether you’ve been away for a weekend, a month or a year, at some point everyone experiences the dreaded “end-of-holiday syndrome”. In Polly Johnson’s experience, there are 6 stages to the process. with the first symptoms appearing several days before the looming flight home...

Stage 1) Denial: If you don’t mention you’re going home out loud, it’s not real. Surely within the next three days you will win some kind of jackpot, be offered a dream job where you are, or find someone willing to swap flights with you, right?

Wrong, and unless you are luckier than most, you probably can’t afford to miss your flight, and when the final call for flight IB3245 to Heathrow is called you can bet you’ll be on board.

Stage 2) Depression: After a few days of pretending it’s not happening, you will reach the stage of resignation.

What’s the point of visiting that last Mayan ruin?

I’m going home in three days anyway.

Get out of bed before lunchtime? Why, I don’t have time to do anything

anyway. I might as well stop having fun now...

Stage 3) Wildness: Not having fun is a stupid idea, so after one day of this, you will do the opposite and turn into some crazed “making the most of every second” madman/woman. This stage can make you do weird T things: like buying r: LU Flick massive sombrero’s for everyone you know, or sleeping on the beach to see one last sunrise, or bartering with a Bolivian Cholita for her entire collection of llama wool socks. Whatever you do, the side effects of this stage will probably be running out of money, (or more likely, getting your belongings stolen in your rush to do lous u c i ied as much as posr: Ur Flick sible) and forgetting

how far you are from your final destination.

Stage 4) Desperation: The result of Stage 3 is that, approximately 36 hours before your flight leaves, you realize that you are currently a 28 hour bus ride from the city you are flying from. This stage is the stage of drastic measures.

But, don’t worry, you’ll jump on a bus just as soon as you are finished your last Mojito, right?

Alternatively, after too much

rum punch, you could drunkenly bargain with your snorkling instructor to sail you to the airport. Or better yet, sail you around the world to your home. Not ideal.

Stage 5) Misery: After pushing your final day to the extreme with stage 4, staying up all night partying then jumping on a 24-hour bus to hopefully somewhere near your plane (note to self: Mexico City is a big place!), and then having to sleep in the airport because you are too late to find a hostel. You will be tired, hungry, grumpy and probably coming down with tonsillitis or some other nasty virus. Maybe home doesn’t sound to bad after all?

Flickr: Emma and Kunley

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Stage 6) Home: You made it back in one piece. And Mum is there to cook you a roast and take you to the doctors for whatever ailments you have picked up on the way. What was the panic for? Home is great...for the first 3 days, until the travel bug sets in again...

Lots of love, wherever you may Rome...

Italians really take their goodbyes seriously. ‘Salutare’, which translates as ‘to greet’ but in this context specifically ‘to say goodbye to’, must be one of the most frequently used verbs in the Italian language. When you’re about to leave somewhere in Italy – whether you’ve been there on a brief holiday or on a year abroad, as I have this year – the Italian friends you’ll have made will almost always ensure that they say a proper goodbye.

In countries like the UK, it’s normal to organise a leaving party or evening out for someone’s last night. But in Italy this isn’t considered enough: that’s just part of the goodbye. That is to say, even when people have seen you the night before your departure, they’ll also be keen to drop by the next day again just to say farewell.

It might seem slightly excessive, but better to say goodbye too much than not enough, I’ve found. I’ve also found that it’s a compliment to the person leaving who – like I was – is

often sad to be going, and makes them feel better about it. This is something I really appreciated when my first semester, in Sicily, came to an end.

It seems that it’s part of the way that Italians, especially those from the South, tend to be more open and expressive from the off than their counterparts in most other countries.

In the UK, when looming separation – and the sadness that accompanies it – tends to be dealt with rather

implicitly. Things are different in Italy. Here, whether a friendship is likely to be a strong and lasting one tends to be made more crystal clear from an early stage. Quite often Italians will simply say, on their first day of meeting someone, ‘I really like you’ or something similarly forward.

Making the effort to give a long, heartfelt goodbye is symptomatic of this, and leaves you with little doubt that the friends you’ve made value your friendship and will make an effort to stay in touch.

Zaki Dogliani

13.05.2015

Expat Expression Overcoming the language barrier

Flickr: Renee Suen

The French love McDonald’s. In the land of croissants, cassoulet and camembert people take their lunch break in groups at the golden arches, munching on le big mac. This pattern follows throughout the globalised world: Italians buy microwaveable pasta; Scandinavians shop at American famous for its delicious street food. Of convenience stores and the Japanese are Kit-Kat fiends. While a course, this particular friend of mine pancake-flat world may seem to threaten regional food traditions, decided that he would prank me… I should travelling foodies keep the edges of this pancake curling up. have seen it coming. I had no idea until, Food migration has a long history. Spices were traded along the one day, I decided that I was hungry! So silk-road, arriving in European ports for a prized seat at the dinner tables I went up to the lady at a nearby of the wealthy. While the modern gourmet traveller wouldn’t think fish ball stall and asked for much of an innocuous dash of black pepper, the addition of such spices some, only to receive one was once as exotic as pomegranate and molasses seems now. When of the most disgusted new garnishes weren’t being introduced, new foods were. Coffee’s arlook of my life. It took rival in Venice, from Ethiopia by way of Turkey, would revolutionise how me 3 months to weed out what my friend had actually told Nowadays, me to say to her nouvelle cuisine instead of fish like this... balls. There was no “fish” involved, I can tell you that much.

Having said all that, I guess that there are always perks to not knowing a language. For one, if you ever get into any trouble with anyone on the street, just give them a dumb look and walk straight past like you have no idea what is going on. I mean, even I got Italians — and the rest of the world — energized themselves for gruelling a hang of a few tit bits from workdays. The original Venetian coffee-tradition, however, is long-gone, my friends now and then forgotten in favour of espresso, which now earns the title of authentic, (mostly the profanities, traditional Italian coffee. For as long as there have been travellers and so it was easy to know diverse cuisines, food tradition has been in flux. when someone was Take the baguette. The bread has become an essential symbol of really angry at me…) France, though newspapers constantly feature stories about the danger but I can pretend that faces France’s iconic loaf. If the French are buying and eating less like I don’t know baguettes, does this necessarily threaten traditional French bread anything anyway making? While the traveller-foodie may relish Gontran Cherrier’s squid right? And to top it ink from namesake boulangerie in Paris, this isn’t the average visitor, nor off, the best thing is it the average French person. Both traditional foods and innovative is when you finally ones have their own specific audience. While the baguette may seem learn the language. inevitable in modern French cuisine, it wasn’t always that way and won’t The look of utter always be. France isn’t faced with the either/or decision of baguette or betrayal and shock big mac. They’re faced with the question of how to adapt their tradition when they see an Indian girl speaking Cantonese, especially ...Is it just as relevant as after someone was just traditional dishes like this? talking behind your back, is priceless. So don’t worry about going somewhere if you don’t know the local language.

You’ll always have a funny story to tell when you get back!

Sohini Paul

Flickr: Nicknamemiket

When I first came to Bristol, the thing that excited me the most was that I would finally be in a country where the majority of people would understand what I’m talking about. Don’t get me wrong here, I’m not socially awkward, it’s just that I’ve lived my whole life in Hong Kong without knowing even an ounce of Cantonese, the local language. You may ask, how is that possible? After all, I’ve done my schooling there, all my friends are there, and in the last 18 years, Hong Kong has become my home much more than Kolkata, where I was born…

But it is. Unfortunately, it did not dawn on me to learn the local language until a few months before coming here and many of the natives don’t know English. Consequences?

A lot of awkward, and usually, time consuming situations.

The first set of flats that we ever lived in were named “Discovery Park”. We used to go to late night festivals at a temple which is halfway across the city, with no mean of getting back home, apart from a taxi ride. A good thing about Hong Kong is that public transport is cheap. However, many taxi drivers aren’t necessarily great at communicating in English. We had tried to memorize the words that would lead us home, but forgot to take into account the six different tones in Cantonese. In fact, one unfortunate misunderstanding meant that we were taken to a remote ferry pier that led to Discovery Bay and left there, stranded, in the middle of the night.

That’s not all. Sometimes friends come as complications in disguise. Once I asked a friend how to say “curry fish balls” in Cantonese, since Hong Kong is quite

Getting pasta food stereotypes: Cuisine in a globalised world

in a homogenising world.

Globalisation will and must change national and regional food trends, but cannot bring them to a full stop. As long as travellers search for tradition and the authentic, food customs — whether conservative or progressive — will continue. The Copenhagen visitor can understand Danish cuisine through nouveau radishes in small pots of dirt, traditional boiled new potatoes and falafel sandwiches. Even how countries externalise foreign foods — the spiciness of Indian food in Bangalore versus Bristol, for example — asserts their traditional culinary culture. Travellers in England are as excited to try Indian takeaway as they are to taste real fish and chips. Food history is a never-ending, ever-growing menu divided by semicolons and commas. No full stops in sight.

Emilia Morano-Williams

Editor: Deputy: Online Olivia Lace-Evans Andrea Valentino Emilia Morano-Williams travel@ deputytravel@ travelonline@ epigram.org.uk epigram.org.uk epigram.org.uk

@e2Travel

A FINAL THOUGHT ON... linguistic censorship In our last ‘A Final Thought...’ column, Anna Rowley considers Turkey’s recent social media censorship.

Suddenly a flashing car skidded to a halt. At last, someone liked the look of the two crazy Brits, jumping up and down! Sadly, the only thing the German Polizei wanted was our passports.

Thankfully they were returned and a ticketless train saw us reach Cologne. Unfortunately, we were trapped. Although we were no longer stranded beside an empty road, the irony was that with no money to spend, the heart of a bustling city was equally impossible to escape from. A conductor on-board a Frankfurt train was blunt, a Polish bus driver furiously told us where to go and our final flung attempt to blag a flight to Berlin was laughed away by the immaculately dressed check-in lady at GermanWings.

The end of the line seemed nigh but we spurred ourselves towards the motorway an hour away. The police stopped us again but we were past concern. We staggered on through an afternoon of rain and waiting before admitting enough was enough, hoping on another ticketless train which took us back to Bonn.

After 36 hours on the road and a mere 30 minutes of sleep the only thing fuelling us was adrenaline. And yet, somehow we managed to keep going, pleaded our way aboard a final train, relied on some dodgy looking kids to help us change at the correct station and finally headed for the finish.

So that was why I was so delighted to reach that final stop, why thrusting that newspaper into the air as proof of our visit to this lonely platform in Siegen felt better than any end of the line I have ever reached.

At last, someone liked the look of the two crazy Brits jumping up and down!

re Wish you we

Edward Henderson-Howat

here!

Dear e2, g one is me takin This photo ciate nt to appre last mome e th cence of the magnifi bul. ue in Istan Blue Mosq to t we forge Sometimes, things ppreciate a d n a p o st around us. ab Khan From, Zain

Credit: BBC

10pm on Sunday evening: most of us can relate to last minute cramming for tomorrow’s seminar, a Sainsbury’s ready meal or perhaps an episode on Netflix. But in March, my friend Ben and I found ourselves standing alone on a dark train platform, thrusting a newspaper into the air beneath an anonymous station sign. Never before had I been so happy to reach the end of the line of this unknown railway in an unknown town in the middle of Germany.

We were taking part in the University’s ‘Jailbreak’ - with 36 hours to get as far from Bristol as possible without spending a penny.

We travelled 800km across Europe but with so many seemingly full stops along the way.

The evening before we left, friends had asked where we would spend the night. However, such worries were brushed aside as we breezed through England, sweet-talking our way aboard a luxury bus bound for Lille.

It was only when we were huddled by a roundabout in the middle of Belgium at 3 in the morning that their concerns began to seem legitimate. Standing on a road for three hours, without a single car acknowledging your existence, would cause anyone to question our choice of weekend entertainment!

Yet our moment of magic arrived when the voice of sweet Caroline emerged from a black Audi. Three hours later we were sat in her kitchen, drinking another pint of Belgian ‘Waterloo’ beer and letting time slip by. This had to be spontaneous travel at its very best!

By 11am we had hitched to Germany but were stuck again on the roadside.

Here in the UK, we take the notion of freedom of expression for granted, not really giving it a second thought because we’re so used to voicing our opinions online, in person and on paper. So it’s genuinely quite hard to contemplate the idea of our government actually attempting to impose some sort of linguistic censorship on our country, almost a laughable idea that might make a good film one day. However, this situation isn’t the case for everyone around the world, as demonstrated by the Turkish government’s recent blocking of social media, causing alarm and shocked reactions worldwide amongst activists defending our right to freedom of speech and use of the internet. To us, at first glance, this seems a dramatic move. However internet censorship is actually quite commonplace in Turkey and so, at second glance, it might make the move a little less unusual – though no less shocking.

The victims? The West’s much loved Twitter and YouTube. In the case of YouTube, the website was guilty because it had been

used to expose government corruption and interference in business and media. It’s punishment? Much like Twitter, YouTube would be “wiped out”. Yet this measure formed part of a wider policy to silence and to smear those denouncing the government’s crackdown on protest movements, including doctors, lawyers and journalists. Although both countries have now lifted their bans, after protesters argued that it breached their freedom of expression as well as their human rights – which it quite rightly did – the blocking of these websites is still worrying in this day and age.

To add to this, being free to communicate and to freely choose the means in which one may choose to do so is a fundamental European value. And yet, this is a country that is on the path to European Union membership.

Credit:Dado Ruvic/Reuters

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End of the Line

Nevertheless, certain tech-savvy Turks still managed to find ways around this ban, obviously ridiculing the government’s efforts.

Visits to both websites even increased in the days after the ban – well there is a saying that any press is good press. However, it’s beside the point that certain Turks illegally managed to access both websites. They shouldn’t have been forced to access them in this secretive manner in the first place. This is because freedom of speech is a fundamental human right that’s simply not malleable.

When a government starts censoring a particular part of society, where does it draw the line? The answer, of course, is problematic.

And how can certain websites such as Twitter be deemed so much worse from say Facebook or Instagram? At the end of the day, they’re both websites where ordinary people can voice their opinions as they please. It’s obvious that this draconian measure need to be stopped – fully – before it influences any more countries. In the meantime, next time that we’ve found ourselves on Facebook yet again instead of revising, we should consider how lucky we are to have unlimited access to such a valuable platform.

Editor: Maddy Streets style@ epigram.org.uk

@e2Style

Online Amelia Impey onlinestyle@ epigram.org.uk

Living

Top of the Blogs

Hattie Bottom’s top three street style blogs to covet I think many of you have, at least once in your life, said that you enjoy people watching. We are fundamentally sociable beings and are naturally very interested in other people’s lives and lifestyles. I personally love the blog Humans of New York- which provides the ultimate in online people watching- and I don’t think any other blog can beat it. Epigram’s Arts Section even took inspiration from the blog to start its own column ‘Humans of Bristol’. However, for the more style savvy people watcher, street style blogs provide the perfect combination of intrigue and inspiration- capturing impeccably stylish people going about their everyday activites, just like us.

For those of you who want to look your best, be up to date on new trends and play with novel style and accessory ideas, filtering through street style blogs can be endlessly inspiring. And basically, it’s just something fun to do other than scrolling through Twitter or Facebook whilst you’re waiting at the bus stop.

So here are my top three blogs to follow for the best of fashionable people watching.

The Sartorialist

Travel

Deputy: Deanne Ball deputystyle@ epigram.org.uk

Number One: The Sartorialist (thesartorialist.com) Scott Schuman, the creator of the blog, was voted one of the Time magazine’s Top 100 Design Influencers.

He is one of the founders of street style blogging itself-starting in 2005- and I still think he is one of the best. All photos have the caption ‘on the street…’

‘Founder/blogger/photographer Scott Schuman began The Sartorialist with the idea of creating a two-way dialogue about the world of fashion and its relationship to daily life.’

Numéro Deux: Le 21ème (le-21eme.com) Facehunter

(Make sure you use the French pronunciation (Luh Van-Tay-Un-Em)- everything seems so much more exciting in another language).

‘This is NOT a Street Style Blog. This is your photojournalistic view into the daily world of fashion from cities and Fashion Weeks around the world. This is a portal into the lives of others, making moments tangible. We have a different eye…so take a look.’

Le Le21ème 21ème

The delicate, zoomed in style of the photography is paired with a blunt caption of ‘WHO, WHAT, WHERE, WHEN’ so you really feel like you’re being let in on a style secret.

Number Three: Facehunter (facehunter.org) Yvan Rodic started this blog in 2006 with the tagline: ‘Eye Candy for the Style Hungry’.

‘More than just a street style photographer, Yvan Rodic is a cultural explorer or ‘blog-trotter’—a new breed of traveller on a perpetual mission to scout out the latest global trends, current cultural happenings and fashion.’

Le 21ème

The Sartorialist

What’s On

Style

This blog is my favourite as it catches ordinary people off guard. There is less of a focus on designer clothing than true individuality. No names are documented, just the location of where the subjects happened to be at that precise time- somewhat romantic.

I’d say this blog is focused a lot more on spotting off- duty models and celebrities of the fashion worldthe emphasis on fame is something you may or may not like. The extremely up-to-date Instagram account makes it so easy to get your daily dose of style inspiration.

Days getting longer? Like music and fun? Hate being bored and hygienic? Well, better grab a tent then.

Jabberwocky//

Primavera//

London; 15th-16th August

Barcelona; 28th-31st May

_____________________________ The music: The Jabberwocky lineup is nothing if not eclectic. There’s no mere quirkiness here however as the performers are drawn together by excellence in their respective fields. There’s a distinct strand of heavy: Earth with their tectonic folk-rock, Justin Broadrick’s Jesu project and Electric Wizard who will be hanging a priest live onstage. Elsewhere, making up for the unfortunate billing of James Blake, Connan Mockasin and Neutral Milk Hotel bring the weird.

Location: Darkest London: the ExCel Centre by the Royal Victoria Dock, to be precise. Guess that’s the price you pay to see such a staggeringly good lineup.

Local wildlife: There may well be a moment on arrival when you decide all the great, weird music you love has been appropriated by hipsters. Then you’ll realize that you’re all actually wearing plaid shirts and skinny jeans and do the sensible thing and watch Kode9.

_____________________

Inevitable celebrity sighting: I once saw a documentary about Justin Broadrick’s band Godflesh, who is performing at Jabberwocky with his lighter project Jesu, which was presented by Noddy Holder. I don’t know about inevitable but here’s to hoping.

Moment where it all MAKES SENSE: The overblown emotionalism of black metallers Deafheaven? Pah! Maybe the perfectly serviceable, but fairly unadventurous space rock of Hookworms? NMH playing ‘Holland, 1945’?

Well, if you’re into that sort of thing. I’ll wager that the real gravy will come somewhere during The Bug’s set, when his debilitating acid-ragga bass will force open unexplored sectors of your brain and you’ll gain the ability to see round corners.

The music: Everything you could possibly want from a three day weekend is provided here: recently reformed acts from the 90s (Pixies, Nine Inch Nails, Slowdive, Neutral Milk Hotel); hugely successful contemporary guitar bands (Arcade Fire, The National); critically acclaimed hip-hop (Kendrick Lamar, Earl Sweatshirt); smooth as silk pop (Metronomy, Blood Orange); vibrant electronica and dance (Moderat); arthouse guitar bands (Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Mogwai)… this is the best place to be this summer.

Location: Parc del Forum, Barcelona.

Don’t worry, that’s a long long way from Benidorm.

Local wildlife: Usual assortment of men with beards mixing with aging former shoegazers with floppy

fringes. It’s the European Coachella, so expect heat and lots of half naked people lounging round with daisy chains and Ray-Bans.

Moment where it all MAKES SENSE: Probably when there are four different once-in-a-lifetime acts all playing simultaneously. That’ll hurt but it will make sense.

Flickr: Rodrigo Ferrari

Best of the Festivals//

The music: In a word: techno. Minimal legend Richie Hawtin will be bringing his near-psychedelic repetitions to rewire your brain, whilst the beatmakers from Berlin drive a bratwurst-sized wedge into the lineup with sets from Dixon, Marcel Dettmann and Ricardo Villalobos. Markedly less stern house sounds will come from Seth Troxler and Hot Since 82.

Location: Croatia’s beautiful scenery and cheap clubbing guarantees sun and sybaritism.

MELT!// ________________________________ Ferropolis, DE; 18th-22nd August The music: Since 1997, Melt! Has styled itself as Germany’s premier electronic meets rock music festival. However, with Rock AM Ring increasing dominating Melt! has increasingly leaned towards electronic acts from across the world. This year anticipate Moderat, Four Tet and Bristol’s own Portishead amongst the diverse array of bands on offer.

Moment where it all MAKES SENSE: It’s long been established that for people from the British Isles, the only condition needed to achieve actual Satori is some hot weather; repetitive beats and proper refreshment can only serve to heighten this state. Sonus gives you the chance to enjoy a Croatian dance festival away from the crowds of the larger Outlook and Dimensions.

Location: Sprawling through several large gardens, the site of the festival holds a quirky mix of arenas to cater for literally everything.

There’s a woodland comedy stage, a craft area, a cinema, and surprises in the Woodland/Gardens. (It’s a piano. And a library. Obviously)

Moment where it all MAKES SENSE: So you’ve finally had it with UK music festivals. Maybe it’s the weather, maybe it’s the lager-lads or maybe it’s the fact that Reading & Leeds seriously believe that in 2014, Blink-182 and Paramore constitute acceptable headliners for a festival charging £220 a ticket. Whatever the reason, you bought your plane ticket and now you find yourself 700 miles from home wondering if you made the right choice. However, when Portishead drop Glory Box on the final night as the warm European sun sets behind you, you’ll find that such questions become irrelevant.

Inevitable celebrity sighting: The low-key nature of the festival makes

Soundwave//

______________________________

Tisno, July

Croatia;

17th-21st

The Music: Dub, Hip-Hop and all things chill. But look past Kiwi jam band eejits Fat Freddy’s Drop and you’ll see legendary producer Madlib making one of his only festival appearances this summer, Gold Panda emerging from hibernation in Berlin to spin his blissful electronica, and The Bug continuing what’s shaping up to be a fairly Croatiadominated summer.

Location: Tisno, Croatia, only an hour’s drive from the waterfalls at Krka. Lots of sun and lots of sea beats a muddy field in Somerset any day of the week.

Flickr: Gregory Csatari

Inevitable celebrity sighting: We’re deep in Germany here, so your odds of running into Zane Lowe are pretty slim. However, if your knowledge of minimalist techno is such that you can distinguish your Marcel Dettmanns from your Steve Bugs, you can expect to see a few familiar faces.

The music: House/techno/garage/dnb/jungle/ breaks/dubstep… as a Bristol resident you may just about recognise the vibe. Also, for some reason, Nils Frahm and Roy Ayers.

Moment where it all MAKES SENSE: Only End of the Road can let you sit on a hay bale at 2am and listen to Robin Ince reading aloud an erotic novel about giant killer crabs while you doubt reality, and frankly I’m not sure that’s an experience I’d want to live without.

The Music: From St Vincent, to Wild Beasts, to psychedelic superstars The Flaming Lips, the End of the Road line-up curates the perfect combination of well-known artists and up-and-coming acts. With four stages, it’s easy to flit between the familiar and the new to expand your musical knowledge.

Local wildlife: Each year, a pan-European menagerie of party-goers descends upon Ferropolis. Here, the German party scene’s liberal attitude towards public nudity and obscene waking hours combine with uncharacteristically hot temperatures, allowing Melt! attendees to keep dancing into the early hours, remarkably unaccosted by high-visibility-sporting bruisers.

Pula, Croatia; 28th-31st August

Dorset; 29th-31st August

______________________________

Inevitable celebrity sighting: Which celebrities love a bit of microhouse? Footballers? TV chefs?

T4 presenters trying to absorb some edge? The only person I can think of who might is Superhans from Peep Show and he’s not actually a real person, just an ideal. Chances are, with its relatively lowkey vibe and status, there won’t be any celebrities there to get spotted, but one might well run into a scantily-clad Troxler at the bar.

Location: Head north from Leipzig or south from Berlin and with any luck, you’ll find Ferropolis; the giant open air industrial museum, which ensures that Melt! takes place under the gaze of several monstrous metal behemoths some of which weigh almost 2000 tonnes.

Dimensions// ___________________________________

it perhaps more likely that you’ll find yourself queuing for the loos behind that evening’s headliner than spotting A-Listers sunning themselves by the main stage.

Flickr: Jules Joseph

___________________________________ Pag, Croatia; 18th-22nd August

End of the Road//

Flickr: Digory McFarlane

Sonus//

Local wildlife: On these shores, minimal techno seems largely to be enjoyed by blogophile bedroom clubbers and drug forum dwellers. In Eastern Europe, if the Youtube videos are anything to go by, it attracts well-dressed, hot men and women who know how to get down to a tinny beat or two.

Local wildlife: Young, happy people who love the idea of a sunny Croatian festival but are uninterested in the aggressive hipness of Dimensions or Outlook .

Inevitable celebrity sighting: Fun Lovin’ Criminals’ Huey Morgan and his wanky goatee. Inevitable in the sense that he’s headlining the thing.

him daggering and gunfingering his way through Ben Klock’s set, passed out topless at the back of Nina Kraviz’s, and eventually getting pissed and making an album with Goldie about George Osbourne and Henri Matisse.

Moment where it all MAKES SENSE: Making a special request for the DJ to play a track by Special Request. Never gets old.

Location: An abandoned fort in Croatia. Music in abandoned things is obviously sick, man.

Local wildlife: Europe’s waviest garms will be flocking in from all over. Particularly common sightings around this time of year include Adidas Tracktops, Palace jumpers and paisley print Nike Airs. Oh, and a Caribou.

See also: Glastonbury, Bestival, Field Day, Outlook, Loveboxx, Love Saves the Day, Beacons, Farr Festival, Sonar, Somersault, Green Man, Nozstock...

Inevitable celebrity sighting: David Cameron, having finally moved past the Arctic Monkeys, has decided to capture the young vote for next year’s election by getting into dance music. Expect to see

Contributions by: Barney Horner, Alex Whitehead, Elinor Lower, Dan Faber, Danny Riley and Mike Hegarty.

Editor: Maddy Streets style@ epigram.org.uk

@e2Style

Deputy: Deanne Ball deputystyle@ epigram.org.uk

Online Amelia Impey onlinestyle@ epigram.org.uk

Travel

Style

4

a SS1 nciag

What’s On

coloured, oversized coat. The line was rife with the short-sleeve, boxy, collared tops which are found in abundance on the high street at the moment and are so much more tasteful than the skintight crop tops we have seen too much of recently (I’m looking at you, American Apparel). If you really must flash the flesh, go for an off the shoulder style; Balenciaga produced numerous pieces in this style for Spring/Summer 2014, and Topshop launched the ‘Bardot Crop Top’ last year.

Aside from the pastels, Burberry must be commended for the use of sheer fabric. Organza is making a new appearance, not used for the classic prom dress as it was in the fifties, but in a less gathered and simpler way, being appreciated for its transparency and shimmer. Organza as panels in tops or as a shift over skirts or dresses, such as Burberry’s high-waisted pants overlaid in lace, is a breath of fresh air after the horrifying trend of cut-out, figure-hugging, mesh dresses that graced us a few years back (and I am sure are still making a regular appearance at Syndicate).

To reiterate, less is more: say goodbye to body-con and welcome looser, boxy crop tops, A-line cuts and pelmet skirts. A glimpse of one’s midriff is quite enough; it should not be mixed with any curvature or, god forbid, cleavage.

Bale

Brigitte Bardot debuted on the cover of French Elle in August 1953, at the tender age of 19. Despite her angelic white gloves and gingham dress, the nakedness of her shoulders foretold of the sex symbol she would later become.

To bring the Fifties up to date, let us be rid of the full skirts, polka dots and halter-sweetheart necklines which have become more of a fancy dress joke than iconic. Think less busty and billowing Marilyn Monroe, more streamlined and smart Jackie Kennedy.

Mix the feminine with the masculine, keep the gingham but replace Bardot’s waist belt with the midriff. Two

pieces rather than one, the coord is everywhere, as the female dress becomes rather like a man’s suit; Jackie O made the ‘pink suit’ famous in the fifties and sixties.

To tone pink down, opt for a pastel shade. Pastels are not going anywhere any time soon and, as summer approaches, they become more appropriate and easy to wear, although they’re ideally matched with a pair of brown pins for those lucky enough to have gone abroad this Easter. Emilia Wickstead’s opening number at London Fashion Week last September channelled fifties fantastically; the pastel pink, textured silk two piece with a boxy, cropped collared jacket and a full, midi skirt was a dreamy, modern interpretation.

However, the winner for a more modern, Fifties look for spring/ summer 2014 has to be Burberry.

The midi skirts were slim line but not the figure hugging pencil of old. The collection was a perfect representation of the feminized masculine two piece. The pastel mints, lilacs and pink two pieces matched, of course, with a

Balenciaga SS14

Living

Coming full circle: back to the 50s

Mono Gingham Bardot Crop Top, £16 - Topshop As my grandma would say ‘leave more to the imagination’ – you might be surprised how effective it can be!

Abigail Southland

Pink: the colour of femininity?

The collections for Spring/Summer 2014 were filled with a variety of new colours that are soon to fill our high street shops. Whether it’s Jason Wu’s white short suits; the elegant red and white dresses from The Row; the icy blues from Rag and Bone; or shiny metallics from Rachel Zoe, the palette is light, bright and refreshing.

However, my excitement over these fresh spring colours soon began to diminish when I saw the abundance of pastel colours and most horrifyingly, the re-emergence of pink in collections from Prada, Prabal Gurung and Moschino. I have never been a fan of pink and tend to avoid overly ‘pretty’ and flowery prints. The colour pink has long been seen as a colour for girls and I feel it encompasses many negative or at least stereotypical qualities assigned to females.

The idea of pink being a colour for girls emerged in the mid-1900s. Previous to this, an article in Earnshaw’s Infants’ Department in June 1918 stated, “The generally accepted rule is pink for the boys, and blue for the girls.

The reason is that pink, being a more decided and stronger color, is more suitable for the boy, while blue, which is more delicate and dainty, is prettier for the girl.”

Clearly this idea changed in the following decades to encourage girls to be dressed in pink and boys in blue.

However, interestingly the reasoning behind the choices seems to have stayed the same. The characteristics of being ‘delicate and dainty’, along with ‘cute’ and ‘pretty’, are associated with the colour pink, and they are traits that I personally wish to avoid.

In recent years, with responses to gender and sexuality becoming increasingly enlightened (in Britain at least),

I find it sad that these forced ideas of gender being linked to colour are still so prevalent. I work in the Kids wear department of a large fashion retail chain and was recently approached by a mother struggling to find clothes for her daughter, who has decided she doesn’t like pink. Young girls should be given the option to show their personality through their clothes and not be left with pink as the only option. However, the girls department is overwhelmingly pink – and if it isn’t pink, it is likely to be embellished with glitter, flowers or butterflies.

Young girls are being overwhelmed with the idea that pink represents femininity. While femininity itself is a perfectly acceptable concept, here it’s a definition of femininity that dismisses intelligence and power but rather reinforces trivial ideas of being ‘girly’, pretty and passive, obsessed with shopping and make-up - traits that are then continually assigned to women even in later life.

With pinks and pastel colours dominant in womenswear departments this spring, we’re being provided with an opportunity to fight against the associations of wearing pastel colours and being ‘delicate and dainty’. I will be taking the lead from the likes of Jason Wu; combining pastel colours with boyish shapes to avoid an overly feminine look. Hopefully a contemporary interpretation of pink and pastel colours this year will stop the assumptions about women that they evoke allowing them to be worn for what they are: colours. www.fashionisima.es

Lily Staunton-Howe

09.12.2013

One-stop Beauty buys LUSH Buffy The Backside Slayer (from £6.25, LUSH)

Queen Helene Mint Julep Masque (<£4, Amazon)

I used to discount LUSH because I didn’t trust the homemade promise of their products. Buffy changed my mind. This works as a pre-shave exfoliator and shave balm in one go. Just wet your legs and rub the

One of the quickest and easiest remedies for oily skin is a clay mask. There are many clay masks out there but this one is by far the cheapest out of the more popular options and therefore ideal for stu-

bar over them in circles.

A quick rinse removes the exfoliating grains, while the nut butters and essential oils stay on your skin, meaning you can shave straight away.

Also approved for use on The Backside!

Weleda Skin Food (£8.50, Boots) This all-natural moisturiser is also the perfect all-rounder; use on dry hands and feet, dry or cracked elbows, sore red noses recovering from colds and eczema, or wear under concealer to stop it creasing (great for under the eyes) or to lock in moisture before even the longest flight.

Georgie Wootton

dent budgets. Once a week, apply the mask to any oily patches – most people don’t need to apply it to their cheeks – wait for it to go solid, then wash it off with warm water.

Wait for any redness to calm down and you should notice reduced oiliness and fewer blackheads.

Stila Convertible Colour (£16, Stila. co.uk and Space NK) Consistently one of Stila’s bestselling products, Convertible Colour works just as well on the lips as the cheeks and

comes in a range of neutrals and bright colours. The easiest way to apply them is just by using your fingers and they wear for hours. My favourites are pinky-neutral Gerbera and the surprisingly flattering, orange Gladiola.

Print vs. Technology Alexandra Keates looks into whether the age of technology means the end of fashion magazines Fashion is instant; it’s easily accessible to all through the medium of technology. However does this access, as immediate as a click of a button thanks to the likes of the internet, iPad and phone, hail the death of the printed word and the downfall of the fashion magazine?

We live in a world of ever evolving technology, where subscriptions to your favourite magazines can be easily downloaded to your iPad or phone. Magazines sites can also now be condensed into an app which delivers the most recent, important news and imagery throughout the day. You can access what you want, whenever you want; perfect for when you’ve lost the will to live in your 4pm lecture. Many techys will uncompromisingly voice the many benefits of the digital magazine; for one, it enables you to store your favourite publications on a small mobile device that can be accessed in any situation, thus automatically showing their superiority against a more archaic printed version which is both

heavier and more likely to be damaged by the elements – a real issue in drizzle Bristol! The dramatic rise in digital subscriptions and online viewers to magazine websites reflects the considerable dominance that technology has in the fashion industry. However, it would be sensationalist to believe that the world of the internet could ever fully replace the luxury of a glossy magazine page.

Fashion is, above all, a luxury and a visionary concept, relying hugely on the way it is expressed by the designer and how it is then perceived by the audience.

However accessible the digitalised versions of our favourite magazines are, they cannot replace the way the magazine beautifully captures the art that graces its pages. The eloquence of design and photography can only truly be shown in all its glory when it is presented on the luxurious glossy page of the magazine in print; thus always surpassing the image on screen. There also

Skincare fundamentals Striving for that perfect complexion can sometimes feel like a real chore; we’re inundated with tips and advice on what to do and which products we should buy when it comes to skin care. However there are a few tips that everyone, no matter their skin type or lazy levels, should follow: 1. Always take your makeup off before you go to bed.

We’re all guilty of skipping this; sometimes, after crawling in from Lounge, the temptation to leave everything ’til the morning is just too much- but believe me it’s worth it. Skin repairs itself at night and a build-up of makeup and dead skin cells will only result in spots, dryness and/ or uneven skin tone. So if you’re lazy when it comes to removal, buy products which make it easier: try Simple cleansing wipes or Garnier’s micellar water.

2. Exfoliate once or twice a week.

Exfoliating removes dead skin cells and impurities from the face allowing fresh cells to be exposed, making your skin look even more gorgeous. Avoid products that contain sharp grains since this will do more damage in the long run. If you have oily skin, exfoliate twice a week however once a week should be enough for most people.

3. Protect your skin from the sun.

Since you’re not sunning it up on holiday just yet, it can seem unnecessary to protect your skin from the sun day to day but this is a common misconception. Even when you’re not in direct sunlight, the sun’s rays can damage skin so it’s essential you protect it, whether this is popping some sun-cream on in the morning before your makeup or buying a base with SPF included. The long term benefits are worth the extra effort.

4. Set up a routine.

This means at least cleansing, toning and moisturising every morning and/or night, although ideally both; it may seem like a hassle at first but it’s definitely worth it.

Cleansing will remove any dirt, oil or bacteria that would cause breakouts, toning balances the PH levels in your skin and preps it for moisture and finally moisturising keeps your skin soft and hydrated.

By following these skin care rules you should begin to see real benefits over time and with summer just around the corner, who wouldn’t want naturally flawless skin to show off?

Bethany Laverack

continues to be something unique, especially in our materialistic culture, about owning a magazine in its true form and appreciating the art and luxury it embodies, quite literally at first hand. Investors also seem to have concurred with this idea as they are still pouring in large amounts of capital spending into the printed media, showing that although the industry maybe shrinking in the shadow of technology, it is by no means dying.

Although there are benefits of the digitalised magazine that cannot be disputed, the emergence of a new venture does not necessarily hail the decay of something already in existence and with the printed industry fighting back, some magazines offering special features only in print, it is clear that magazines will continue to thrive alongside their digital counterpart.

What’s On

The best pick of this fortnight’s theatre, film, music and more.

Theatre & Comedy Mayfest Bristol’s annual festival of contemporary theatre returns this year with a tantalizing programme, offering a mixture of fledgling local talent and internationally acclaimed artists. The acts range from dance to circus, cabaret, theatre and comedy, all of them fiercely imaginative and wonderfully obscure. For full listings, visit mayfestbristol.co.uk 15th – 25th May Various venues

Travel

Living

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Editor: Josie Benge whatson@ epigram.org.uk

What’s On

Style

Love Saves the Day, Castle Park

We. Are. Young.

Likely to be easily relatable for many us, We. Are. Young. is a comedy depicting the lives of three twenty-something year-old women struggling in a world where jobs are scarce, everyone has a degree, and Facebook determines your happiness.

15th – 17th May Alma Tavern and Theatre 8pm

Film

Gigs& Nightlife

Frank A wannabe musician discovers that he’s out of his depth when he joins an eccentric pop band fronted by the mysterious and enigmatic Frank, who also happens to wear a giant fake head.

Showcase Cinema de Luxe 9th May onwards nna

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Chris Martin Charming, fresh and original, Chris is a rising star on the UK stand-up circuit. He combines intelligent social commentary with silly, immature gags to make you giggle.

Friday, 13th June Colston Hall 8.30pm

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The Two Faces of January From the screenwriter of Drive comes a thriller centered on a con artist, his wife, and a stranger who try to flee a foreign country after one of them is caught up in the murder of a police officer.

16th - 29th May The Watershed

3 of the best...

Bristol Music Festivals Flick

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Phantogram After a two-year hiatus the New York electronic duo have returned in 2014 with a tour to accompany their album, Voices.

Monday, 12th May Thekla Dizraeli and the Small Gods This local band combine the two worlds of hip-hop and folk to create foottapping tunes which are surprisingly heartfelt. If you fancy something laid back, original, and very very ‘Bristol’, these guys are sure to get you dancing.

Friday, 6th June Fiddlers Mr Scruff The now legendary Mr Scruff is famed for his quirky hip-hop sound, epic six hour sets and his sense of the comic. He should leave you grinning and boogieing the night away.

Saturday, 17th May O2 Academy

Flickr: Eva Rinaldi

Summer is here! And one of the best things about living in Bristol is that you don’t have to go far to find a great array of live music. Take a look at some of the festivals going on this month, right on your doorstep.

Love Saves the Day Perhaps the best known Bristol-based music festival, LSTD delivers a stellar line-up year on year. 2014 will see Annie Mac, SBTKRT, Jamie XX and Cyril Hahn take to the stage among many others.

Tickets have sadly sold out, but re-sale tickets are often advertised from the festival’s Facebook event.

Sunrise Celebration Considered to be the UK’s leading sustainable festival, Sunrise is a celebration of ethical living and alternative culture, which is entirely powered by renewable energy.

Musically, it’s incredibly diverse; the line-up is an eclectic mix of folk, dub, ska, electronica and reggae.

Dot to Dot Festival A great indie alternative to Love Saves the Day. One ticket to this citywide festival allows you access to 14 hours of live music across multiple venues such as the O2, Thekla and the Fleece. This year is headlined by Peace, Drenge and The Midnight Beast.

Sat 24th - Sun 25th May Castle Park

Sat 28th May - Mon 1st June Chepstow Estate

Saturday, 24th May Various venues in the city centre