10 Things that Every UMN Student Understands

10 things every University of Minnesota- Twin Cities student goes through at some point during their 4 years there. You just know you’re a UMN student when you experience these things.

1. Sprinting like your life depends on it to catch the Campus Connector, the University Ave. Circulator, or the 4th St. Circulator.

You will never not feel embarrassed as you run like crazy to catch that bus. When you’re actually on the bus and you see someone else sprinting, you laugh, but then you remember you did that yesterday. Somehow the bus drivers almost always ignore your hard work to get there and just drive away anyway. It’s a UMN Student thing.

2. Having one random class in St. Paul or West Bank at 8 A.M. and regretting it every day when you have to get up at 7 A.M.

Although the campuses are beautiful, you will never not be disappointed and just all around annoyed when you are planning your schedule for next semester and see that the only available sections for your required class are either on West Bank or even more inconveniently in St. Paul. You begin to wonder why your random Public Speaking or University Writing class wound up being anywhere, but somewhere on the mall.

3. Feeling rich on Gopher Gold and Flexdine, yet being broke in actual cash and soon wishing that every store or restaurant took those instead of real money.

It is always a great feeling being able to pay for stuff using Gopher Gold or Flexdine at the Coffman food court or at Starbucks. It is never great going out with your friends to Dinkytown or downtown and having to spend real money…that you don’t have.

4. Confusing people from home when you call the University of Minnesota “The U,” as apparently only people from Minnesota call it that.

Anyone who is not from Minnesota understands that when you talk to other people from home you must call the University of Minnesota- Twin Cities by its lengthy full name because there are understandably about 50 colleges lovingly called “The U.” When you do accidentally call it by its nickname, you receive a very odd and confusing look in return, followed by “Where is that again?”

5. Learning to develop a hatred for not only those pesky Badgers but the Hawkeyes and Iowa as a whole.

As a University of Minnesota student, it was essential for you to learn the cheers used at all of the sporting events. Most importantly, it is inherent for you to learn the school’s favorite cheers to be used against UW-Madison and Iowa, the U’s biggest rivals.

6. Watching someone wipe out on the ice in the winter and having a good laugh…while secretly praying it doesn’t happen to you at some point.

During winter, it is prime time to get a good laugh in watching people struggle to get across campus on the snowy, icy tundra that is the University of Minnesota campus. Watching countless people fall off their bikes or totally wipe out while walking will never get old…until the day it happens to you.

7. Losing connection to Eduroam right when you are trying to submit your final paper on Moodle… due at midnight.

Eduroam will always either be your best friend or your worst enemy when it comes to getting free internet WiFi. It somehow always works perfectly in the basement of the academic buildings, yet somehow when you’re sitting in your dorm trying to submit a paper or take a quiz on Moodle, it crashes leaving you helpless.

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8. Experiencing your first true Minnesota winter…and second…and third… all within a span of six months.

Coming from anywhere in the Midwest you know what its like to have a bad winter, yet somehow comparably Minnesota seems like a totally different continent when it comes to weather patterns. Not only is there snow and below zero temperatures beginning in November, but there is somehow also blizzards consistently through April giving you the equivalent of Christmas in Spring.

9. Always being sick of people from home asking you if it’s really THAT much colder up there.

When you go home for your first break, you always get the “Where is the University of Minnesota again?” And when you tell them Minneapolis, they give the generic response “Oh, isn’t it really that cold up there?” You respond with a sigh and then a yes, knowing that they will still never know how bad it really is. It comes with being a UMN Student.

10. Finally, trying out the Gopher Way, but somehow got lost along the way somewhere under East Bank.

Sometime during your first year at the U, you will probably decide to hide from the cold and regrettably take the Gopher Way tunnel system. You soon find out that some parts of it are definitely not as easy as you had thought and instead of ending up at Coffman, you somehow end up at Northrop.

What do you think of these 10 things every UMN student understands? Let us know in the comments below!

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