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Welcome back readers, and thank you again for picking up this edition of Quench, it’s a good one! Hello and welcome back to another issue of Quench Magazine! As I’m writing this, we are five weeks into spring term, which means – for final year students like myself – the end is close in sight. Although I will be progressing onto an MA course next year, I still find myself feeling emotional at the thought of my time as an undergraduate coming to an end. Soon, many of my friends will be preparing to leave Cardiff to enter graduate jobs, go travelling, or just to have a well-deserved rest! At the thought of this, I have found myself holding my friends a little closer recently and cherishing the memories I make with them a little bit more. I share these reflections because they are particularly fitting with our chosen theme for Issue 192: Union. University has allowed me to unite with so many people from different walks of life because we share common interests. Whether it’s the friends I’ve held close since first year, the bonds I’ve made through my course, or the friendships that have blossomed because of Quench, the strong sense of unity that life at university encourages is a special thing to me. As always, our editorial team have done an amazing job at interpreting this theme and exploring the many different avenues that come with it, and our contributing writers and design team have brought these ideas to life brilliantly. Whether it’s reading about the University and College Union’s strike action, or reflecting on the future of marriage, there is something for everyone in this issue! A big shout out as well to our amazing Editor in Chief, Alexa, and my wonderful co-Deputy Editor, Molly. I’m so grateful to Quench for bringing us closer together. I hope you enjoy this issue, see you in the next one!
Maddie Deputy Editor
I hope you are doing well and looking after yourselves. We are now about halfway through the spring term, and this year is already going very very quickly! Since the last edition, the weather has started to get a little bit brighter, a tad warmer and a lot more promising! As we start to approach Spring, it is so wonderful to see the light start to seep back into Cardiff, especially the gloomier areas of Cathays… This edition of Quench is all about Union, whether that’s looking at friendship, diversity or reunion. If you take a trip down to the literature section, I contributed to a piece all about the power of friendship in novels. I really loved writing this piece because it allowed me to reminisce on one of my favourite books I’ve read this year and what the relationships there meant for me. The theme Union has allowed us to produce some really thoughtful, reflective and positive pieces about some of the most powerful things about being human, and most likely topics that we fail to discuss a lot of the time. As we enter sunnier months and brighter times, maybe discussing the importance of friendship and togetherness is the thing to do. Once again, our writers, editors and designers have been working very hard to deliver this beautiful magazine so I hope you enjoy reading it! I hope this edition is a nice reminder of the beautiful things that bring us all together despite adversity and difficulties. A big thank you as always to our fabulous team, especially Alexa and Maddie, who all work incredibly hard and I am very grateful for! Thank you again,
Molly Deputy Editor