| Description | Interview with Hilary Waugh, recorded on the 9th July 2003 by Jennifer Carter.
JC Well thanks very much for coming along Hilary.
HW That's okay.
JC Thanks for giving up a little of your time and to talk a little about your time here, your four years. Five years it will be?
HW It is four. I squeezed it into four.
JC Ah, you did the mode B, or whatever it is called. You come from a long way away. You have come from Dumfries. So what drew you here?
HW The main reason was the quality of the French department, because I had read various guides and they all said that the French department was good and I also wanted to - most people from my school ….which was a really small school..
JC Which one was that?
HW It is Wallace Hall Academy. It is really small and most people were going to Edinburgh or Glasgow. So I thought I will go somewhere different!
JC So what sort of guides did you read that gave Aberdeen a good press for its French Department?
HW It had things from the Herald in the paper and I had something, I think it is an unofficial guide. It is Virgin bookshop or records, they have an unofficial guide.
JC So you didn't go and buy any of the established ones like the Times Good Universities Guide?
HW No I read in the Herald and in the papers. And what you hear people say as well.
JC You had heard good things about Aberdeen?
HW Yes. There were a few girls a couple of years ahead of me who came up.
JC And they were pleased with their experience.
HW Yes and I got an unconditional offer, so I didn't have to any work in sixth year at school!
JC But you nevertheless stayed for a sixth year?
HW Yes I did. It was great.
JC But you must have done pretty well in the fifth? Did you get straight A's or something.
HW I got an A, 2 B's and 2 C's.
JC And on that you got your unconditional. Good. And you were fixed on the idea of doing French originally for single Honours?
HW Yes, because I didn't really think about it too much. I thought French was what I wanted to do and I can always change when I get there. I didn't really know too much about the whole University set up. That you could do joint or single. I didn't really understand it too much.
JC Are you the first in your family to go to university?
HW My parents didn't but their brothers and sisters did. But yes, I am the eldest, so I am really new …
JC A pioneer?
HW Yes.
JC So in first year you arrived with a view of doing French, but not much clearer an idea about what else?
HW No. I didn't. It struck me about a week before. I came up and thought "I will have to do something else".
JC So you sat with an adviser of studies, did you?
HW Yes.
JC Who was that?
HW It was David Hartley. Who was great.
JC He was in French of course. And he was able to persuade you to do something else as well?
HW He asked me what I was interested in and where I saw myself going and he said well give it a go, you don't have to, you can change if you want. I did Spanish as well.
JC You did French, Spanish and IR in first year?
HW Yes. I didn't do Spanish after first year. I got confused. I kept getting French and Spanish mixed up! So stick with what you know.
JC And French has worked out well for you?
HW Yes. I have really enjoyed it.
JC You must have had to spend two summer spells in France, did you?
HW I spent 6 months in France in the second half-session of third year, at university in France. Although having thought about, I have spent three summers in France working. But I might not have had to that, but it was really good.
JC So you were one of those that went to a university rather than going into the schools system. How did it work out for you?
HW I went to a Political Studies Institute in Lyon, and it was great, because the courses were taught in French, and the actual university courses that the French people do were all quite relevant to IR and Politics. So it wasn't just choosing from out of the blue, you know. And the French did a Language and Civilisation course for foreign students, which was good, but there was such a difference in the levels of competence in French, although we were supposed to be the middle class, you were streamed. You were the middle one and they had people like us just taking it as a second language, and there were people who were from Cameroon and Senegal,, where it is more or less their first language, so it was good overall.
JC So the actual experience of living in France - was that good? How did it compare with Aberdeen?
HW I did not expect it to be so.. . I really thought it would be, you know here they had the Freshers stuff for you and the societies, and they didn't have any of that. And the Halls of Residence in France they were a separate business, they are nothing to do with the University. So when I got there it was grotty and they just gave me my keys and I had to go up two floors and just find the room myself. So I got on with it but it is not as much of a community, I didn't feel.
JC But good for the experience as it were?
HW Well people went home every weekend. The Halls of Residence just emptied. It was only the foreign students that were left at the weekend.
JC So did you meet foreign students?
HW No, I didn't meet foreign people. It was hard going in January. I think I might have met a wide variety of people. I met people outwith the University circle as well.
JC And did you have to cater for yourself as well?
HW Yes. But the facilities were not great. They had one kitchen for about 400 people, so I bought a little Plaque and cooked in my room. It was fine. It was warm, so you didn't always want to have stew! I am quite happy with salads. It was good I enjoyed it.
JC Okay, so we skipped ahead of your arriving here in Aberdeen. You arrived here from Dumfries, from a small school, to what was already then quite a big university. You had a good first meeting with an adviser, but where were you living?
HW I lived in Dunbar Halls. Very good, and very friendly, and easy to meet people. And I think it is good having catered halls for when you leave school, you know you are half living on your own, but there was meals on and there was always someone to keep an eye out for you.
JC So Dunbar was a big success for you?
HW Yes, definitely. I thought it was a very, very nice place.
JC And did you do just the one year there?
HW Yes I did, in the second year I moved into a house with friends.
JC And you have stayed in that way ever since?
HW Yes, pretty much. Different flats, in different areas of town.
JC Did you have any problems getting these different flats ??
HW I have been so lucky. My experience of getting houses and flats is not the norm. But my one in second year, it was someone's big brother who had just graduated and it was his house, so he was looking for tenants. In third year I shared with a girl who was also doing mode B, so we had a six month lease on a flat and she had the flat already, so I just moved in, and in third year, someone's boyfriend was leaving.
JC So it was all good fun?
HW Absolutely, it was great. But that is where.. I don't know anyone else who has had that all the way through. I have been very lucky.
JC You have been exceptionally lucky. Well that is nice.
HW Well it has been really easy!
JC That is good. So, coming back to the academic side, you started with French, you tried Spanish, but didn't quite like it. IR grew on you did it?
HW Yes, it really did. The first couple of terms the first year, it was fairly... I don't know, they were racing through the stuff. To introduce you to all the concepts, but it did interest me a lot and then .. Yes, first and second year were quite dry but of course they have to get all the information into you, but in third and fourth year it was amazing, I really enjoyed it.
JC All sort of optional stuff?
HW But you need to do the first and second bits so you can get on to do that.
JC Of the two courses you took, which one did you choose to do your dissertation about?
HW In French. It was more politically based. A lot of people did it on novels or films or stuff, but I did it on the changes in France in the first half of last year, about the Euro being introduced and all the problems with the Presidential elections, because we were there at the time.
JC So you must have had first hand experience.
HW Yes, it was very odd. It was a very odd atmosphere. Especially at the Political Studies Institute, everyone just, … I had never experienced anything like that before.
JC Did they expect Chirac to come out as the winner?
HW Not in the beginning, I think it was, I think they thought that Jospin, would get through to the next round, but I don't think, certainly anyone I spoke to thought that La Pen would get to the second round.
JC Which he did of course.
HW Which he did.
JC Leaving Chirac as the only choice and not a very popular one.
HW No, indeed. It was in the paper it was either we have to vote for a crook or a fascist, so choose the crook.
JC Extraordinary .
HW Yes it was very bizarre!
JC What did these experiences leave you with in terms of the debate between Britain and Europe? I mean are you a pro-European person?
HW Yes, I think I am. I am not sure that I do agree that Britain has to satisfy different criteria to get into the Euro, but I think it is a good thing. I think it is .. I think integration in Europe is the way to go. For commerce, also for a levelling of standards, because it is .. That is always one of the questions about Europe as well, is someone in the north of Scotland as European as someone in the south of Italy? Or something like that. So I think that some integration of monetary and cultural institutions is really good.
JC What is your own theory about why we are so weak, not you yourself personally, but as a nation on European languages?
HW Och, I don't know. I suppose it is not encouraged really. At school anyway, and more in maths or English classes. There were only two French teachers and so we in first and second year at least, with about 30 people with one teacher, when in Maths it was a bit less because they had a few more teachers. So maybe it is that. Because at our primary school they did, they taught us little bits of French. But I don't know. Maybe it is the number of teachers.
JC Or the way it is taught?
HW Yes, I mean I always thought it was always okay, to be honest. But I think some people thought why are they just teaching us, you know, "My hair is brown" you know the basics! It was not relevant. And what you are teaching us takes ages. It is not interesting and if you have to do the little, you know on the tape, the conversation. You know it is not very real. But I thought you have to do that and you go off and practice it in France yourself.
JC Did you feel well prepared when you started in first year French here?
HW I wasn't really sure. Because I had got a A in my higher and I had done SYS and I was in France the summer before, and I thought I was quite good at school but it was big fish in a small pond. I thought I would come to uni. It was fine in first year. There was quite a lot of it was revision but you know there is always new things, vocabulary and different grammar things. So I thought I was just right. So it was good. Which is great going to university, because I was "Oh ! No. I am not going to be clever enough. They are going to find out" . But no. it was actually fine.
JC And thinking of the people whom you have met in the departments you worked in, particularly French, are there outstanding teachers who have registered with you?
HW Yes, In French I would say that David Hartley and Ian McLaughlin as well. They were very good.
JC You really enjoyed their courses?
HW Yes, even what they were teaching wasn't what I thought wasn't very interested in, they make it very interesting.
JC And in IR?
HW Michael Sheenan. I think he is great. He just knows so much stuff and he is ..
JC Good.
HW He puts it across very well. A few others but definitely those three stand out.
JC Thinking not so directly with the subjects that you have done, but the supporting network, have you found the facilities good in terms of library and computing and that sort of thing?
HW Yes, I always have.
JC No problem.
HW Only in .. I always tried to get a bit of the groundwork done for my essays quite early on because I know the week the essays are due ……
JC You can't get to the books.
HW Yes, and I would find myself referencing something quite obscure because I can only find it in .. Sometimes it feels that there are not enough books. In first year IR, that's .. because there are so many people. But I thought that was okay. In French I didn't need masses of library support, because I just ended up buying the novels anyway.
JC What about the computing side. Were you computer literate when you came up?
HW Well not really, well, yeah, but not anything to ..
JC Not to a standard that you needed?
HW And they did that Academic Skills Week, which I thought was quite good. Especially the computer bit, because I couldn't attach emails and all that. So I thought it was really good from that point of view.
JC We will come back in a minute perhaps with a bit more on the communication side, but thinking of other University services, other than the library and computing, have you had occasion to use the other services, like Careers, Student Health, Chaplaincy, Counselling?
HW I have been to the Careers Office.
JC And they have been helpful?
HW Yes, they have. I could have probably have used it more. But as I say I was so busy trying to think about my finals and …I could have probably used it more and they were helpful. And I had an interview with them, but I didn't know what I wanted to do, so I suppose they can't do anything with a woman with no direction!
JC They helped you with your CV?
HW Yes, definitely. It has been good. And they did a seminar for Modern Languages students. So that was really interesting. Student Health just as a GP.
JC You have not used any of the other University services of that kind?
HW Not Counselling or anything like that.
JC Chaplaincy?
HW I have been to a couple of services just on a Sunday, but not regularly.
JC Very few people go nowadays, I understand?
HW I am not regular up here to be honest. I am when I am at home.
JC Interesting. To come back to the point about communications that we touched on with computing and you said that you got into it much more here. Presumably you use Email a lot?
HW Yes I do.
JC Mobile phone?
HW Well I only got one in second year. I thought that's quite late. Everyone else had already had one since …
JC Were you texting or using it for calls mostly?
HW Both. I need to not have one, because I am just a blether!
JC What about Societies and things. You have told me you are always pretty busy, but you joined the French Society? Presumably the IR Society?
HW No we set up our own one in fourth year, but nothing really to be honest.
JC Tell me a bit more about the one you set up in 4th year.
HW Well..
JC It is quite late in the game!
HW Well we have handed it on now, but we thought about the type of music we were into, the late 1980's early 1990's music and there didn't seem to be a night in the Union and like a group of like-minded people getting together.
JC What, it's unfashionable now?
HW Pretty much it is, but then when we had out night at the Union loads of people came along, and I thought …
JC I don't think I would know any of the names, but what ….
HW The Smiths, Oasis and Brit-Pop if you like..
JC So that is now going to continue as a society?
HW Well someone else set up a similar one, so we have just given them all our email addresses that we have and the people that joined this year. We didn't think anyone would want to join. We thought we could just have it for us!
JC So what have you mostly done with your time outside academic stuff. You have done a certain amount of socialising with friends whose flats you shared, ..
HW I have worked an awful lot!
JC You have worked hard. You have really felt you had to work hard. Are we talking academic work or paid work?
HW Both really. I have had to both.
JC Tell me a little about the paid work.
HW I have had pretty much one job the entire time I have been, since, I started in 2001, and when they let me go, I have been working in McCalls on Bridge Street, Menswear, Dress Hire, Highland Wear. They let me go away in the Summer to work in France and they let me go away to university in France and I just left last month.
JC How did you get that particular job?
HW My flatmate was walking past the shop and I had been applying for jobs, but he saw this sign in the window and went in and asked and got the phone number. I thought it was so typical after been applying and applying for all these jobs and someone sees a notice in a window!
JC And they were good employers? And you enjoyed working there.
HW Yes really good and I enjoyed working there.
JC And reasonably good pay?
HW Yes, the minimum wage. It is better than nothing you know.
JC What sort of hours were you putting in?
HW Normally I did 5-8pm on a Thursday night and all day on a Saturday. So it was only 10 hours but sometimes they needed you at other times.
JC You would come in at shortnotice …?
HW If I could. I mean I totally understood the whole … I couldn't most of the time, but if I could help out I would, especially if I needed more cash.
JC Doesn't sound as if the University's Joblink service was a help to you?
HW No, I did have a look. I did have a look a few times, but when, before I got the job at McCalls, but I didn't see anything that was really me. A boyfriend had got one through there I think, but …I thought the service was useful, but I didn't find anything for me. Maybe that is just the way it is.
JC How did things work out for you financially? I mean you were sweating away at the academic work and working in McCalls, how were you basically paying your way at University?
HW Well, what was annoying is that my rent wasn't covered by my loan.
JC So you took out your maximum loan entitlement each year?
HW Yes. I got money from my parents and money from work.
JC So those three items added together. So does that mean that you have a big loan to repay now?
HW Well it is quite big because I went to France, and you get more in France and now they are to re-access me as my little sister is in London. So I got a bit more this year. I don't know, I have about £12,000 to pay back, I am not really sure.
JC That is a little above the average, I think, which is about £10,000, I believe.
HW I couldn't tell you exactly how much it is.
JC It doesn't sound if you are really daunted about it?
HW Och no. Well everyone has got it, haven't they? And it is just going to come off your pay-packet like tax so ..
JC So you are not really basically bothered?
HW Oh I can't do anything about it, can I?
JC No, No, and it wasn't something which made you hesitate to come to university. Because that is quite interesting, isn't it?
HW No, I don't think so. Mum and Dad always said just get the maximum loan out and it is at a low interest rate now and when you leave university we can either help you pay it off - you know just go for it, it doesn't really matter.
JC Well that seems very sensible.
HW Well it was. I didn't ever think that I wouldn't come to university because of money.
JC Well that is interesting, sort of as a policy point.
HW I didn't think, although they say that on the news all the time, but .. I don't know whether it is just …..
JC But it has not affected you in any way?
HW No.
JC What about any of your friends. Any ideas. Were any of them affected, in the sense of not wanting to come up to university, or in the sense of regretting it once they were here, or dropping out.
HW I don't know of anyone who has dropped out because of the money, but I know people have been hesitant to come from Dumfries, a few people stayed in Dumfries and went to … Glasgow University has got a campus there and Paisley University has got a bit of the tec college, stayed locally.
JC Because of money?
HW Yes, I think …maybe not just because of the money, but a contributing factor.
JC Thinking of your 4 years among the students here, it has been I gather, on the whole a good experience.
HW Yeah, definitely.
JC Would you have any general comments about, I don't mean your own experience, but things you have observed, the feel of being a student here. A lot of people say, for example, that there is an awful lot of drunkenness amongst the students?
HW Yes there is, definitely. I think people do drink too much.
JC Did you yourself?
HW Yes. I think to an extent everybody does.
JC Really?
HW Yes. Then when you sort of realise that you have to get up and go to university, you know, but I think it is as well when you leave home. Then it is, nobody is telling me what time you have to be back or what you know….
JC So everybody goes a bit wild?
HW I think everyone just does just because… you need to learn.
JC The women as much as the men?
HW Oh yeah, I think. I don't think they are drinking as much, because I don't think they can, but I don't think there is any difference in how much ….
JC What about drugs, because that has become much more of a problem in Aberdeen, I don't know about the university specifically, over the last 5 years. Has it touched your life at all?
HW Well I don't really do anything myself. It doesn't really interest me. But I know a lot of people who smoke cannabis.
JC And it is easily obtainable?
HW Well they all seem to have it! So I presume so. To be honest I don't really know about it.
JC But it is not something that you shut your personal life to completely?
HW Well if I am at a party and people are doing it, I just don't really think about. A few people take ecstasy, but very few.
JC Do you think people are warned sufficiently of the dangers of drug taking?
HW Yes, I think there is so much out there. I mean they have signs in bars and places on the back of the cubicle door. They always have posters about you know, this is what you should do.
JC Don't take ecstasy, don't take LSD.
HW Yes, and if you are going to, just be sensible and drink lots of water and all this.
I think there is no excuse.
JC What about promiscuity? That's the other accusation you hear, you know, students are all sleeping around all the time?
HW Well, yeah. I think again it is "I am free, I can do what I want, I can go home with whoever I want". I don't think people are having enough safe sex. I think they are really .. it is something that everyone has got to worry about. Do you know, the only reason I am so.. is that my mum is into all this well-woman and teenage clinics..
JC Is she!
HW Yes, and I think it is quite worrying. You can sleep around all you like, just be careful! But I think there is no excuse for that either, because they have condom machines all over the place. And you get them free at the family planning and at the doctors. They are really good with advice, but I think people are really stupid.
JC What about other aspects of you know, the student community. For instance another thing one always hears is that students are not interested in politics. Now this obviously not true of you, as it is part of your subject, but what about your friends, I mean did you find them a-political?
HW I think most of our crowd of friends do politics and IR so ..
JC What sort of political engagement did they have? Did they tend to be members of national political parties ?
HW I don't .. If they are they have kept it quite quiet! If they are, I don't even know if some of them are, but there is quite a broad spectrum among my friends, from you know being quite socialist, quite lefty, to being quite .. just across the board.
JC It is very interesting hearing your comment that people kept it quiet. I can remember the days, when for example, the SNP in particular, everyone who belonged wore a badge among the students.
HW Yeah, I don't know.
JC What about student politics, voting in SRC elections and that sort of thing?
HW Some of them say they just cannot be bothered. I vote. But I thought, why if you don't vote then don't moan about the opening times of the Union or the selection of stuff they have in the shop, or things like that.
JC So you have always voted, but never stood for office.
HW No. Helped hand out leaflets and stuff for people, but nothing myself.
JC What about the representative system within the University? Class Committees and that sort of thing?
HW Yes, I was on a couple in first year for French and maybe in second.
JC Did you find those useful?
HW People didn't come to me, and I had a notice things, but ..
JC I am the rep!!!
HW I said to people in the classes , you know, come and tell me. But nobody really said, so I tended to say a few things. I don't think people use it enough.
JC So you think more could be done through that channel if people were more engaged?
HW It is also down to the class rep, that they make the effort as well. In first year people don't really know that you can say this is … I don't really like this…
JC They could you chop your head off!
HC If you say something, this is why there is a class rep, I don't think… But I sort of understood that was what they were for, but if it was someone else that was the class rep I probably wouldn't have said anything, because you don't really know when you first start, do you?
JC That is what University if all about, the experience.
HW Yes it is.
JC Any other aspects of your life here that we haven't talked about that you think we ought to have done?
HW No, I think that's… work, play..
JC Where you stayed, money?
HW That's the worst.
JC So money is the worst.
HW I suppose I having said that, the reason I haven't got any money, is that I live an extravagant life style!
JC You are not a good manager?
HW Oh, no. I need to write it down. I think to write it down everything you spend ..
JC Sharpening up that side of your university experience! A depressing conclusion!
HW Yes, but it was great!
JC Well it has been very nice talking to you.
HW Thank you.
JC Thank you very much indeed.
End of interview.
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