As I lay down my student life espadrilles, and immerse myself in the wonderfully demanding pastime of moving house for the fourth time since 2007 – I turn my attention to a key feature of student life – the cleaning.
These guys epitomise why landlords and homeowners despise students. I have lived in a drosshole like this in the past and believe me, it isn’t the fun and games portrayed in this film. Some may call me boring, uptight or no fun because in my Uni days I liked to live in reasonable conditions. Have you had to scrape mould of some animalistic slob’s 5-day-old spag bol pan just to rinse a mug in order to make a cup of tea? That’s suffering.
However there is one thing worse than being a complete slob – and that is it’s polar opposite – the person who tears miscreants limb from limb for every teacup left lying about. I proudly ensconced myself firmly in the middle of the two extremes, perhaps leaning more towards the Nazi side than the slob side. But what has fascinated and frustrated me in equal measure is how volatile this issue can be – I have seen relationships between very close friends deteriorate into full-on war because of issues surrounding cleaning. I have had virtual death threats from former housemates in the past because they felt I wasn’t pulling my weight surrounding cleaning.
People, especially landlords, took one look at me and thought: Male + Student = Less Personal Hygiene Than A Kings Cross Vagrant. Admittedly, my bedroom has always been a cluttered tip. But as far as I’m concerned, my bedroom is my space, the one my rent pays for, and I’m mainly the person that uses it. However, the kitchen, bathroom or living space (if the house is luxurious enough to actually have one) , places where everyone frequents, I am more inclined to be the big bad wolf. I once saw a bathroom on video which had a sink and bath full of fortnight-old vomit, and a carpet of rubbish stretching from the entrance hall, through the kitchen into the backyard; all in the same once-proud Edwardian terrace house now housing (all male, obviously) students. If I’d lived with these guys, they’d have wanted me dead (or probably gaffa-taped traffic cones to my bed or some other crazy student caper) for daring to tell them that their standards of cleanliness would have rats running screaming from their pad. I would have hated them not for their personalities, but because they were just so oblivious to how horrendous their living conditions. Did their parents not teach them basic cleaning practice?
There are ways of dealing with issues like this without getting personal, though, as seen above, it is hard not to turn nasty. Cleaning rotas belong in workplaces, not homes. And don’t get me started on passive-aggressive tactics..(leaving rude messages on doors, sharpie marking every sheet of loo roll you bought). Tempting though it is to scream blue murder at the dirtiest of housemates, in the long run it just makes you look petty. So it;s a tough one to call. Giving them out gives one a sense of catharsis; receiving such diatribes can make one’s blood boil. I even went through a phase of taking the rap for everybody’s mess not just my own in order to prevent all-out war (and to jolt the real culprits into actually owning up). All this did was leave me open to be accused of absolutely every scrap of mess, even if it was nothing to do with me.
A few things I wish people would remember to prevent World War IV over cleaning:
1) If you don’t want people to nick anything, keep it out of sight and out of communal spaces.
2) Empty the bin, and take it in turns. Don’t just wait till it over flows. Witnessing another housemate’s misfortunes with a splitting bag of rubbish (containing a large amount of fermenting rice) on the stairs is proof of that.
3) Don’t keep cleaning up after everyone else. They just take the piss and then you get the flak if you stop cleaning up after them.
4) If it has mould on it, you may want to clean it now.
Friendships made at Uni have the potential to last a lifetime. It is such a shame they can be blown into smithereens by an issue as trivial as cleaning.
