RHUL – The Orbital

University is the Most Confusing Time of your Life, and No One Talks About it

16Nov

By Claudia MacalusoNo Comments

Opinion

University is the Most Confusing Time of your Life, and No One Talks About it

By Claudia Macaluso Picture this. You’re eighteen, it's Christmas Eve, you’re sitting around a table with loads of people who you’re apparently related to, and you suddenly get asked this question: “So how’s uni?” And you shudder, thinking to yourself, “How could I possibly answer that nonchalantly?” The truth is, university is undoubtedly the strangest time of your life, and you’re not given enough credit for it. Everyone anticipates this moment for most of their teenage years, and yet when the time comes, you turn into this tiny goldfish who gets tossed into a massive aquarium full of fish species you’ve never even heard of before. One of my friends once told me, "I would love university if I didn’t actually have to do university.” You’ve been in education your entire life, yet...

16Nov

By Kiera GarciaNo Comments

Opinion

Loosen Your Stitching

By Kiera Garcia When living in an age where identity is everything, the idea of fluidity appears to be a perilous game. We're expected to know who we are, our desires, and our beliefs, and know exactly how to articulate those thoughts. I know that I fell victim to the idea that if I hadn't had my whole life figured out by the time I was 18, I would have failed at life. After coming to university and having the subsequent almost quarter-life crisis of realising that I did not have my entire self figured out already, I realised how dull and colourless life would be if I never changed. The idea of being the same as I was when I was 13, and even the same as when I was 17, frightened me. This does not make the process of evolving and developing your identity any easier. The cliché of ...

‘A Place for Everyone’: An Interview with Kiera Joyce

16Nov

By Carmen Vallejo AndersonNo Comments

Sports & Socs

‘A Place for Everyone’: An Interview with Kiera Joyce

By Carmen Anderson Given the nigh-on meteoric surge in worldwide interest in women’s rugby, we spoke to the president of Women’s Rugby here at Royal Holloway, Kiera Joyce, to understand a little bit more about her, the sport and her commitment to it. Kiera is a third year English Literature student. Aside from sport, she is passionate about the performing arts, involved with many societies. She previously played hockey and is planning to start playing polo. She had never watched or played rugby before starting her studies here, but on first introduction, Kiera “immediately fell in love with the game!”. Rugby is a contact sport, a highly physical game requiring top levels of fitness and can be deemed high-risk, with 1 in 4 players injured each match. What does Kiera find a...

14Jun

By Felix PoréeNo Comments

Culture & Literature, Literature, Opinion

How Did Life End Up With Us?

By Felix Poreé and Olivia Taylor Introduced as the first book of a quartet titled "The Secrets of Life: From Big Bang to Trump", SS O'Connor's How Did Life End Up With Us? presents itself as an attempt to answer the most pertinent of questions surrounding the laws of life, from the start of the Big Bang all the way to the ‘decisions’ that organisms make that ultimately determine their chances of survival. One anticipates that such questions would require substantial scientific research, and although O’Connor admits he is not a scientist, his undertaking, given to the reader in a conversational writing style, is divided into specific chapters that aim to cover such topics as natural selection, gene mutations, and evolutionary change, down to parasitism, mutualism, and altruism. O’Con...

24Apr

By Olivia TaylorNo Comments

Culture

Hopeless Romantic by Dolly Alderton

I have held myself back from discussing Dolly Alderton for quite some time now. I first read her debut memoir Everything I Know About Love three years ago, during lockdown, and I have not shut up about it since. I’ll admit, her fictional debut, Ghosts, did not impress me as much; I quickly realised it was her confessional tone that caught my attention, hence why her autobiographical work and her ‘Dear Dolly’ advice column have left such a lasting impression. Since reading Everything I Know About Love, I have continued to stay up to date with her work, but I only recently found an essay she wrote for The Pound Project in 2018 titled ‘Hopeless Romantic’. The Pound Project is an independent publishing company founded by JP Watson. Their message is to shout about ‘the value of readin...

<strong><em>Will you go on the record? </em>How ‘She Said’ reminds us of the sad realities of Hollywood. </strong>

1Mar

By Daisy ClarksonNo Comments

Culture

Will you go on the record? How ‘She Said’ reminds us of the sad realities of Hollywood.

Released five years after the original article from The New York Times was published, ‘She Said’ tells the story of the two journalists who uncovered the Harvey Weinstein sexual assault scandal. Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey are played by Zoe Kazan and Carey Mulligan respectively, yet the film also includes actresses who were victims of Weinstein including Gwyneth Paltrow and Ashley Judd, who play/voice themselves. The film itself is subtle, yet the statement it makes is bold. By criticising the very industry that it has been created in, the film sets out to confront the industry professionals who will be watching this film – many of whom will have worked with Weinstein, maybe even defended him. ‘She Said’ does not glamorise Hollywood or the media industry – it does the opposite.&...

<strong>Where do we even begin? </strong>

25Feb

By Sofia BajerovaNo Comments

Opinion

Where do we even begin?

I left the tube station, aggressively double clicking the side of my phone to ensure that Apple Pay, custodian of my Monzo card, was ready to do its job. The expected bout of hyper self-awareness kicked in, certain I was subjecting myself to the glares of the people behind who were shouting obscenities at me in their heads. I was absolutely sure of this. I went through the ticket barriers without a hitch, unlike a man ahead who had a less fortunate experience and, as a result, our lives intersected for a few brief minutes. Dressed in a blue suit with a carefully placed Prostate Cancer UK badge pinned at the lapel, he strolled through the station with a wide stance, and an increasing verbose rhetoric of disappointment. Without remembering his exact words, he claimed he was shocked and d...

<strong>‘Positive’ Discrimination: Race, Language and Labels</strong>

25Feb

By Jethro RobathanNo Comments

Opinion

‘Positive’ Discrimination: Race, Language and Labels

‘… “Reverse discrimination”, which translates to “Keep those Negroes running – but in their same old place”.’ – Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man BAME (Black, Asian and Minority Ethnics). POC and BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and people of colour). Catch-all, pre-packaged tags ready to slap on those boxes we call ‘people’, when we feel so inclined. Establishment guarantee included, free of charge. My gripe with race terminology has long been one of passive resistance yet complicit subscription. This is my guilty confession; more so, this is a personal attempt to unravel the netting of politically correct and functionally useless labels which colour (pun intended) our ever-growing vocabulary of racial identification. A few mandatory disclaimers before I let loose. Conversations...

7Jan

By Sofia BajerovaNo Comments

Opinion

Fresh Starts

What even is a fresh start? Is it when you finally decide to put in place that new skin care routine? When you paint the walls and move furniture around in a room to make it feel brand new? How about when you move to a new house, town, or country? When you walk into your first class in September, or when the clock ticks past midnight on New Year’s Eve? Why do we look for fresh starts? What makes us feel the need to start over and do something different? Does it originate from a deep sense of stagnation? The feeling of not being good enough? Is it the sense that we could do better? I once rented a house which had one of those patterned, textured wallpapers in the hallway. It was painted over with a fresh coat of white paint to make it look brighter and more modern, ready ...

7Jan

By Emma HollyNo Comments

Opinion

No, I Haven’t Finished Yet

You didn’t orgasm, and now they’re rolling away from you. Their chest is heaving, and you aren’t all that out of breath. You get that sinking feeling that you’re done now. There’s a stickiness in between your legs and a heaviness in your chest, and you can’t articulate that deep discomfort you’re feeling. Maybe you did. Maybe it was the best sex of your life, but they’re already getting up and heading to the bathroom without you. It makes sense; they’re cleaning themselves up, but you feel rejected. Instead, you hug your legs to your chest and call yourself over-sensitive. Sex is a three-part story: the build-up, the act, and the aftermath. We know how the build-up goes; a coy dance that ends in people deciding that this, this is good. Sex itself, the climax of this performance. It’...