Shy bairns get nowt
I GRADUATED from Newcastle University with a degree in surveying and mapping science. The degree was only a minor part of what I took away from three years in the ‘jewel of the North East of England’.
The locals taught me many things, in the 90s this included; dealing with break-ins (three), never leaving anything on display in a car, and creating a lifelong habit of checking the car is locked at least three times.
Some argued that it was more useful to leave the car unlocked. I also learned that the Happy Mondays is not a sought-after cassette and that the only people friendlier than the Geordies are Glaswegians.
But what I mostly took away was:
- Attention to detail.
- An increased passion for working outdoors.
- A fascination in understanding and applying technology.
- Memories of discussions, including space observation, sensing accelerations as humans, and the many different styles of teaching, planned, unplanned, assured and vague.
- Lifelong friendships.
- The most important lesson was that ‘shy bairns get nowt’. That’s not simply a phrase about asking, it’s also about doing.
That course and the location lit a fire.
Andy Evans FCInstCES, President