University

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:01:01 Hello and welcome to The Luxury Podcast. My name's Jonathan Vernon-Smith, and with me is William Hanson. This is the podcast that helps you live A more luxury life.

William Hanson 0:01:22 Hello, Jonathan and I are here to help you create the everyday moments of luxury that make life worth living, whatever your budget.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:01:28 You're not reading it. What's going on with you?

William Hanson 0:01:30 I'm trying to do that from memory.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:01:31 You've memorised it?

William Hanson 0:01:33 Yes. I like the fact you still have to look down for, by Jonathan Bird and Smith.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:01:37 I do. I literally, yeah, but this is my world. I can't remember anything unless it's written down.

William Hanson 0:01:41 Your world.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:01:43 Anyway, in each episode of The Luxury Podcast, William and I will tackle an area of life that we think you should upgrade. We do. We really do. Sorting the Onslows from the Hyacinths advising the nation in gracious living. So William, gin and tonic in hand—

William Hanson 0:01:59 No, it's a water. With lemon? It's a fizzy water with lemon.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:04 It's not. Why can we not admit that we are having a cheeky gin and tonic while we are presenting today's special?

William Hanson 0:02:11 Well, true. I drink during the other one, so I might as well drink during this one.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:16 Have you been drinking before this?

William Hanson 0:02:17 Mm.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:18 Oh, wow.

William Hanson 0:02:18 Yeah.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:19 We're in for a goodie, ladies and gentlemen. So what are we talking about today?

William Hanson 0:02:22 We're talking about university.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:25 University.

William Hanson 0:02:25 Higher education.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:27 Lovely.

William Hanson 0:02:27 Now, are you university educated?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:30 I am university educated.

William Hanson 0:02:32 So am I.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:33 A long time ago.

William Hanson 0:02:34 Ah.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:35 Yes.

William Hanson 0:02:36 How long?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:37 I went to university in 1998.

William Hanson 0:02:40 Oh.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:40 How old were you?

William Hanson 0:02:42 7. No, no, I would have been younger. No, I was probably 9.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:52 No. Oh my God. Right. Okay.

William Hanson 0:02:55 In fact, yes, you went to university when you were 18 or 19?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:02:57 I don't know. I went straight after sixth form. I guess 18.

William Hanson 0:03:01 So I was 8.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:03:01 You were 8. Wow. Okay. Well, yes, 1998 I went.

William Hanson 0:03:07 And what did you read? And we should say, if you want to be more luxury, the correct verb is read, not study.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:03:13 Yeah. Well, I did English Language and Linguistics. Same. Did you? Yeah. Oh, I did not know you did English Language and Linguistics.

William Hanson 0:03:24 Yes, indeed.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:03:24 Oh, how lovely.

William Hanson 0:03:25 English Language, Linguistics, and Literacy, I think it was called.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:03:29 Oh.

William Hanson 0:03:29 Because they were very big on how child language acquisition—

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:03:32 I love child language acquisition books. Do you? Yes.

William Hanson 0:03:36 What's your favourite one?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:03:37 Oh, I read Noam Chomsky. Oh. Same.

William Hanson 0:03:47 We should get our Chompsies out and compare.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:03:49 Let's. Yes. Oh, yes. Gosh, I— Steven Pinker.

William Hanson 0:03:54 Did you do Steven Pinker?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:03:55 I can't remember.

William Hanson 0:03:57 He's actually probably a little bit more recent.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:04:02 Yeah, I don't remember him, to be honest, but I definitely remember— I loved child language acquisition. I found that fascinating. No, you see, that's where we differ.

William Hanson 0:04:09 I like phonetics and pronunciation.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:04:12 Well, I like that as well, But I loved the whole idea of how people learn a language. And of course, you've got that window, haven't you? Till 7. If you don't encounter a language before the age of 7, you'll never truly acquire it. Did you know that?

William Hanson 0:04:29 Oh.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:04:29 Oh yeah. You weren't paying attention, were you?

William Hanson 0:04:31 No. That, or the syllabus had moved on. Yeah. The research had changed.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:04:34 That's why people who've got— who are— I was going to say bisexual— bilingual, you should talk in all of your languages at home with your little children.

William Hanson 0:04:45 To be fair, I've got got friends who, uh, speak— their children are only just beyond 7, one of them's still under 7. They speak German, Italian, French, and English.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:04:54 There you go.

William Hanson 0:04:55 And you think, wow, and then they're so young.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:04:57 And as long as they're exposed to it before the age of 7, um, they will speak it like a native. Whereas if it's after 7, you may well learn the language, but you'll never truly know it like a, a native speaker.

William Hanson 0:05:13 Wow.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:05:13 Clearly, I took this more seriously than you did.

William Hanson 0:05:16 Yeah, I mean, I was also working as an etiquette coach.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:05:18 Oh, okay.

William Hanson 0:05:19 That's—

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:05:20 I was fascinated by that. Fascinated. The fact that all different sounds, you know, you as a baby, you hear different sounds.

William Hanson 0:05:29 Yeah.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:05:30 And that's why people, for example, a Chinese person, they, they, they make different sounds to the sounds that we make in our language.

William Hanson 0:05:39 What sounds would they make?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:05:39 Well, I'm not going to do that, William, for very obvious reasons. But I mean, Rodrigo, when you learn— when you grow up speaking Spanish, you learn to be rhotic, don't you?

William Hanson 0:05:54 But I'm from Bristol, so I'm quite rhotic.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:05:55 Are you?

William Hanson 0:05:56 A Bristolian accent is rhotic.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:05:57 Go on then.

William Hanson 0:05:58 Well, I don't have one. But I know that the Bristolian accent is a rhotic accent.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:06:03 Yeah, because they do like a tongue twister, because you have to learn that when you're a Spanish speaker. And of course, we don't have that sound in English. Yeah. And what's the thing they teach you, Rodrigo?

Speaker F 0:06:15 I actually don't know. I've never done a tongue twist.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:06:19 Oh, well, there you go.

William Hanson 0:06:21 It's different in Peru.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:06:22 It's different in Peru, but they do like a rrrr, and they teach the children because they have to be able to rrrr. If you can't rrrr, you're in trouble. Rrrr. Oh, well.

Speaker G 0:06:38 That sounds like a garden.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:06:39 Never heard it sound quite like that before.

William Hanson 0:06:41 Thank you.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:06:42 We can practise your Rs.

William Hanson 0:06:44 It's Spanish. Yeah, Spanish is really—

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:06:45 yeah. When we're in Frigg, we'll give your Rs a good going over.

William Hanson 0:06:49 The trip's looking up.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:07:00 Anyway, so back to what we studied. Yeah, so we studied the same thing. I'm fascinated. I didn't know that.

William Hanson 0:07:07 You must have done, but you've forgotten.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:07:09 Probably told me, but I wasn't listening.

William Hanson 0:07:11 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Did you enjoy university?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:07:13 Parts of it. Parts of it. I didn't necessarily enjoy all of it at the time.

William Hanson 0:07:18 Okay.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:07:18 But looking back, I think it was essential for me because I grew up, as you know, I grew up in Harpenden, which for anyone that's—

William Hanson 0:07:30 Do you want to tell people where you went to university?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:07:32 I went to Roehampton University of Surrey. Yes. Very executive campus. Not far from the Roehampton Estate.

William Hanson 0:07:43 Oh.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:07:43 Which, for a boy from Harpenden, was quite an eye-opener.

William Hanson 0:07:47 Really?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:07:47 I'll be honest with you. Yes.

William Hanson 0:07:49 The Roehampton Estate, is that National Trust?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:07:51 Maybe you and I should go and do a special from the Roehampton Estate one day.

William Hanson 0:07:55 What sort of estate? Is it like an estate, or is it estate?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:07:59 Do you remember the character Vicky Pollard?

William Hanson 0:08:02 Yes.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:08:02 Yeah, but no, but yeah, but no, but— She's from Bristol. Yeah. Well, all of the exterior shots were shot outside Roehampton Estate.

William Hanson 0:08:09 Oh, I see.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:08:09 Yeah.

William Hanson 0:08:10 Oh, I thought Roehampton Estate was, you know, full of deer and a nice big Capability Brown garden.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:08:17 No, Roehampton Estate is either 3 or 4, I forget, very high-rise blocks on stilts.

William Hanson 0:08:22 Oh, why on stilts?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:08:24 I don't know. They've got a kind of stilty bottom to them. But it's gorgeous.

William Hanson 0:08:29 Lovely.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:08:30 Yeah. So, I went to university there, and I think looking back, it was very good for a middle-class boy from Harpenden to go and be exposed to all kinds of things I'd never encountered before.

William Hanson 0:08:43 Like Wizz and Spliff.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:08:44 What? What's Wizz and Spliff? Well, I know what a spliff is.

William Hanson 0:08:52 I don't know what Wizz is. I thought it was an airline, actually.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:08:59 I didn't go to university and become a smack rat. But no, it was certainly an interesting experience. Did you enjoy yours?

William Hanson 0:09:08 Yes, I think I did. Again, it's a bit like sort of my last couple of years at school, where I did start to enjoy school. It's just a shame we had to do all the lessons.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:09:16 Yes.

William Hanson 0:09:18 So, I enjoyed university, but just actually— and I would do it again in a heartbeat if it weren't for the fact I don't want to do the lessons. But I enjoyed all the co-curricular and the sort of the clubs, which we'll come on to, and the friends and the socialising.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:09:30 The clubs and the co-curricular?

William Hanson 0:09:33 Yes.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:09:34 What sort of—

William Hanson 0:09:35 Well, you know, because I did student radio and student TV.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:09:37 Oh, did you? See, I didn't do any of that. Oh.

William Hanson 0:09:39 What did you do? Nothing.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:09:41 My best friend at university— so, very early on, I think maybe my first ever lecture, I met my friend Cockney Kate. And Cockney Kate and I hit it off immediately. She's from Crawley, she's not actually a Cockney, um, but she and I hit it off immediately. And Cockney Kate realised that I needed managing. So Cockney Kate arranged for all of our lectures— we chose subjects that happened all day on a Monday and a Tuesday morning.

William Hanson 0:10:10 Nice.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:10:11 By which point we were then done for the week. So we had Monday All day, very late. Tuesday to lunchtime, and then from then on, it was a mixture of drinking and working at odd bins for me.

William Hanson 0:10:28 Oh, yes, of course. Yes.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:10:30 So, I wasn't really active.

William Hanson 0:10:31 Is that Roehampton odd bin still there?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:10:32 It was Mortlake I worked in.

William Hanson 0:10:34 Oh, sorry.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:10:35 Mortlake. And I did the occasional shift in Putney.

William Hanson 0:10:37 Ah. And are they still there? Could we go and— No.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:10:42 No, they're not, unfortunately. Well, I know the one in Mortlake isn't. I mean, I'm not sure that Oddbins is around at all now, is it?

William Hanson 0:10:47 I don't know. Did you get a staff discount?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:10:49 Oh, I did at the time. Yeah, well, I used to get a free bottle.

William Hanson 0:10:52 What, every day?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:10:53 Well, François, who was my manager, he used to always insist that we tested a wine while we were working. I loved it. You can see why I enjoyed that job.

William Hanson 0:11:04 Yeah, it was made for you.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:11:05 And often I would get to take some home, whatever we hadn't consumed during our shift, before I'd head home. But I love that. Yeah, so most of my time, I did my kind of university bit, easy-wizzy, let's get busy, 2 days, and then the rest of it I was working and enjoying myself.

William Hanson 0:11:21 So, if I said to you now, you need to go back and do the last couple of years, the last 3 years of school, or your 3 years at university, which would you pick?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:11:30 What, with this exactly the same going back in time? School.

William Hanson 0:11:35 Oh, that's a downer, isn't it? university. Yeah, I would. Why?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:11:39 Well, the last year of my university wasn't so fun, to be honest.

William Hanson 0:11:43 What, because you have to do a dissertation, or—

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:11:45 Well, there was more work, but also I had, um, well, one of my flatmates, uh, she, she became in a relationship. She got in a relationship with one of Putney's biggest drug dealers.

William Hanson 0:12:00 Yeah, you've said this before.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:12:01 And, uh, unfortunately, that our lovely student flat became a rather unpleasant place to be.

William Hanson 0:12:08 Yeah, I bet it did.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:12:09 There was one day I found a gun on the coffee table, and it was at that point when I told my mother, she said, you must come home to Harpenden this minute. So I kind of, uh, but because my lectures were still on a Monday and a Tuesday, I kind of commuted from Harpenden. I used to stay in my flat on a Sunday night and a Monday night, and then as soon as I was done, back up to Harpenden.

William Hanson 0:12:30 Lovely.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:12:31 Back to civilisation.

William Hanson 0:12:32 Yes, quite. Okay, fine. Well, yeah, I would— I'd probably do university more than school again. Yeah, but that's because I had a nice— well, first year— did you do— did you do fresh— student halls?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:12:43 Halls of residence for the first year.

William Hanson 0:12:45 Were you catered or uncatered? Fully catered. Fully catered? Yes.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:12:50 And do you know what? Guess what I had for breakfast every morning?

William Hanson 0:12:53 Eggs?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:12:54 Full English. I had a full English breakfast every morning at university.

William Hanson 0:12:59 Was that the start of the fat back?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:13:00 No.

William Hanson 0:13:00 No?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:13:01 I've got a—

William Hanson 0:13:02 Jonathan just flicked his microphone.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:13:06 There was a fly on my microphone. Um, no, I was ever so skinny at university.

William Hanson 0:13:11 Gosh.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:13:12 Very heavy smoker. Yeah, no, I didn't have any problems with the fat back at university.

William Hanson 0:13:17 So, I went to university in Manchester, the University of Manchester, to read English language, etc., and, uh, I was catered to. Well, I think I've told you this. You had to put down your sort of choices for accommodation, and so the brochure came through with all the different places, and I wanted to be in the Victoria Park campus, which was described as quiet, leafy, suburban.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:13:40 Oh, lovely.

William Hanson 0:13:41 That's me all over. We applied for that, then a couple of months later got the choices through. You haven't got any of them, your top 3 choices, of all the different houses within Victoria Park. Instead, I had been put into Tree Court in the—

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:13:55 That sounds like Pond Court. Did you have an orange triangle?

William Hanson 0:13:59 No, but it had electricity. In the Fallowfield campus, where it said it was the heart of student life, is how the brochure described it.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:14:08 That means above the bar.

William Hanson 0:14:09 Yeah, it was. And it looked— well, actually, Tree Court was sort of a square with a courtyard with a tree in the middle of it, funnily enough. But it was next to— I can't remember what it was called, but it did look like Nelson Mandela House.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:14:22 Right.

William Hanson 0:14:22 Generally, it was a tower block called The Tower. I think it's all been demolished since I've left. Oh, I know it has. And yeah, it was noisy. And you told the story the other day of your mum taking you to university and sort of being very worried. Was it you cried or she cried?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:14:38 Well, she did actually get a bit tearful, but it was largely me that was tearful when she'd gone, when I realised that I was living in a hellhole.

William Hanson 0:14:44 Well, apparently my mother got in the car and was driven back down south by my father, and she cried because she thought, how is William going to live there?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:14:50 Yeah. but it did you good. It made you the man you are.

William Hanson 0:14:53 Exactly.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:14:54 In the same way, I think it had a good effect on me.

William Hanson 0:14:56 But I remember going down for dinner at 7:30 in the halls, but because it was Manchester, they had finished by then because dinner was at 5.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:15:04 Oh.

William Hanson 0:15:05 So I ended up cooking every night because 5 was too early for dinner. I didn't want to eat then. So I actually didn't make any use whatsoever of the catering.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:15:13 Yeah.

William Hanson 0:15:14 It was also pretty grim.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:15:15 Yeah, I don't remember any of the food apart from breakfast, because I always had my full English. And I remember that on a Friday, because it was a Catholic college that I was at, and they did fish and chips on a Friday. And my room— I mean, talk about the worst person to get this room— my room was directly above the extractor fan from the kitchen. Can you imagine?

William Hanson 0:15:41 Oh, it must have stunk.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:15:42 I know. It's probably where I've got my hatred of cooking. Yes.

William Hanson 0:15:46 Oh my God, this is where it starts.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:15:47 That's where it started. So, on a Friday, this disgusting smell of fried fish, 2 of the worst smells in the world, would waft through my little skylight. I wasn't happy at all.

William Hanson 0:16:01 Oh no, you don't want that.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:16:02 No, it's awful. It's dreadful. And my room had— I didn't have a bathroom, didn't have an en suite. I just had a sink in the corner of the room.

William Hanson 0:16:09 Yeah, same.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:16:09 Did you? So you had to use the communal bathrooms? Ugh, horrible. And scrub as I might, I could not get the limescale off that tap. And I tried for a whole year, I tried, but it was horrible and the room stunk. And it was back in the day, I was in— my halls was smoking. So everyone on my floor, they were all smokers. So you can imagine the smell. It was just absolutely— it was terrible.

William Hanson 0:16:39 Well, I remember that's when it was in the Easter holidays of first year I got my flat in Manchester, the luxury penthouse apartment with executive breakfast bar. And I got it, I can remember thinking, well, I'll do a night in the flat, then I'll do a night at halls. I'll sort of have 2 residences. I'll be like an MP at the time. I'll oscillate between both. Never went back to halls. Never went back.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:17:04 No.

William Hanson 0:17:05 No.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:17:05 My second year, I moved from halls to my flat in East Sheen. And that was quite an experience. We lived above a shop.

William Hanson 0:17:17 What was the shop?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:17:18 Well, it's still there, so I'm not sure I should— because it will— I won't say the name of the shop because—

William Hanson 0:17:23 But what did it sell?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:17:24 I'm not telling you because now I can tell more stories if I don't reveal where it was.

William Hanson 0:17:29 Okay.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:17:29 Okay? But my landlord and landlady were Mr. and Mrs. Patel, And this is where we had the rats. Do you remember the rats in the ceiling? Oh, yeah.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:17:39 I've told you before. And Mr. Patel didn't want to get anybody in to actually remove them properly, so he put his own poison down. And I looked out the kitchen window one morning, and it was like something from a horror movie. The whole garden was just full of dead rats. And I went into the shop, and I said, Mr. Patel, there's dead rats all in the garden.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:18:00 And before I knew it, he was out there with a bucket and a litter picker. Putting them all in his bucket like nothing had happened before. But I had a very strange experience. I remember, it's just come back to me now. In my second year, a complaint was made about me.

William Hanson 0:18:15 About you?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:18:15 Yes, from Mr. and Mrs. Patel.

William Hanson 0:18:18 Why?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:18:20 I got a phone call from the letting agent, and I won't name the lady, but I still remember her name. And she phoned me up and she said, is that Jonathan? I said, yes, because I was the lead person Of course you were. I was the one that had found the flat. I was the one that was the central point of contact for any issues. So she said, Jonathan, we've had a complaint. And I said, what's that? And she said, Mrs. Patel says that you have been seen in an intimate position in the back garden. I said, I beg your pardon? She said, Mrs. Patel says that you've been having sex in her back garden.

William Hanson 0:19:11 Her back garden?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:19:12 Her back garden. With a woman. I said, trust me, that hasn't happened. I remember that now. But I remember feeling it was horrible. I was accused of this. I was thinking, what are you talking about? And she was— I went straight into the shop. I said, Mrs. Patel, I don't know who you saw in your back garden, but it was not me. Can you imagine? Oh, God bless Mrs. Patel.

William Hanson 0:19:55 Good old Mrs. Patel. Yeah.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:19:57 So that was my Second year.

William Hanson 0:20:00 So, we've— we talked about it a minute ago, but you didn't do any— you didn't do any clubs or student newspaper or—

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:20:05 None at all. No. I was busy working. I worked at Oddbins and I worked at TalkSport. 'Cause I— I know that might surprise some of you, but—

William Hanson 0:20:18 Were you the diversity hire?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:20:31 How dare you? How dare you? No, I was one of the creatures of the night.

William Hanson 0:20:35 That's what Mrs. Patel accused you of.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:20:38 Yeah, so I worked at TalkSport.

William Hanson 0:20:52 Wow.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:20:52 It was knackering. I just— I used to do— I used to finish university, and then I'd do an evening shift at Oddbins, finish that, and then I'd have to leave Mortlake, drive to— at the time, I seem to remember TalkSport was based near Waterloo.

William Hanson 0:21:15 Oh, Southwark, yeah.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:21:16 Yeah, I had to drive there. And then I would start my shift at 1 o'clock in the morning, work through until 6, wake up in the morning, and then go straight to my lectures the next morning.

William Hanson 0:21:28 Oof.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:21:29 Yeah, it was exhausting.

William Hanson 0:21:30 What a grafter you were.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:21:32 Well, I had a very expensive lifestyle to pay for.

William Hanson 0:21:37 You did.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:21:38 Yeah. And they wouldn't accept my overdraft anymore.

William Hanson 0:21:41 I did both. Well, I sort of wrote a little bit for student newspaper, I just can't remember what it was called. Student Direct! It's all coming back to me now. The Manchester student newspaper. And I remember I'd been very annoyed where Rona— can't remember her last name— I took her out and pitched— she was head of lifestyle— I pitched a housekeeping feature for Student Direct.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:22:05 Is this another student?

William Hanson 0:22:06 Yeah, she was older. Yeah, Rona.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:22:09 Oh, she a mature student?

William Hanson 0:22:11 No.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:22:12 Oh, they were the worst, weren't they? God, the mature students.

William Hanson 0:22:15 So I pitched her in a café a feature, a running feature for each week called Now That's What I Call Housekeeping.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:22:22 Oh, luxury.

William Hanson 0:22:23 You would've read it.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:22:23 I would've read that.

William Hanson 0:22:24 Where I was going to give different housekeeping tips for the student each month. I think it was a monthly paper. She said no. I was very annoyed. I had a whole photoshoot done as well. I wonder if I still have those photos, actually. It was literally just me making my guest bed. It was a whole— me with a whisk.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:22:39 Oh, Rona, you missed out on a classic feature there.

William Hanson 0:22:43 Yeah.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:22:43 Stupid woman.

William Hanson 0:22:44 But instead, I busied myself with student TV, where we did The William Hanson Show. Tapes are still available.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:22:51 The William Hanson Show? It's a chat show. Was it?

William Hanson 0:22:54 Yeah, we had different people on. We chatted. Like whom? Students, uh, the voice of the London Underground, my friend Emma Clarke came and did a turn. Did she? And then we had a different musical act to play us out. And we filmed it because we discovered There was a whole TV studio at the university that they didn't let anyone use. And we're like, well, what's that doing? And there was a whole production team that sat there to operate it. And we said, well, we should be using this. So we did.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:23:21 Wow.

William Hanson 0:23:22 So I think we did 8 episodes. It was quite fun.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:23:25 I'd love to see an episode one day.

William Hanson 0:23:27 I shall see if I can muster up enough courage to bring that to you.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:23:32 Can we upload one to Patreon?

William Hanson 0:23:33 That will be for the Platinum tier. And I did— so that was Fuse TV, was the student TV, and the radio station was Fuse FM.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:23:44 And you worked on that as well?

William Hanson 0:23:45 Where I was head of oral programming.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:23:47 Of course you were.

William Hanson 0:23:48 Yep. And looked after all speech-based programming. There wasn't much of it.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:23:53 Oh.

William Hanson 0:23:55 Apart from my show, William Hanson Live.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:23:57 William Hanson Live.

William Hanson 0:23:59 But those— but I love— and actually, some of my best friends still to this day, including Leanne, my former neighbour, were made through Fuse FM.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:24:07 There you go.

William Hanson 0:24:08 So that's, that's why I was— I am still in touch with some of my course friends, and I'm quite close, but probably the co-curricular is what has given me most of my friends.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:24:17 I don't think my university even had a radio station. I don't think so.

William Hanson 0:24:22 So you would have been right at home.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:24:23 I don't think I would have done it because I was already working for proper radio, proper radio, so I don't think I would have done it.

William Hanson 0:24:30 You wouldn't sink to that level.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:24:32 No, I don't think I would have done. But, but no, I don't think they did. It's very religious. There are always, you know, church services and all this stuff. What?

William Hanson 0:24:43 On student radio?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:24:44 No, at the university.

William Hanson 0:24:46 Oh, no. I don't know if it's still like that. Jesus, no.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:24:48 Yeah. But I think in the first year when I was at university, so I was in the horrible halls, and then my friends were largely in the nice halls. So that's where I met my friend Janice.

William Hanson 0:25:02 Yes.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:25:03 Who is sadly no longer with us. But Janice was a kindred spirit for me in the first year, because I realised that she, like me, liked to play practical jokes on people. And we realised that each hall of residence, you could phone another floor. You had a phone at the end of your floor. Oh, wow.

William Hanson 0:25:23 Okay.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:25:23 So you could phone. So I had the phone near me. So my job, when parents used to phone for their children, I would have to go and answer the phone and then go down to the room and say, your mum's on the phone.

William Hanson 0:25:33 Oh.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:25:33 Yeah.

William Hanson 0:25:34 Glorified secretary.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:25:35 That was basically how it was because it was outside my door.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:25:37 I had a lovely telephone manner though. Of course you did. And we realised you could phone internally for free. So we used to do practical jokes on people all the time. We worked out the number for the security guards at the front gate, so we used to phone.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:25:54 And there was one time where we phoned and we pretended we were a student that was trapped in the library, And we were trying to ask for help, and we sat and watched the security team go across the line. So, that was really fun. But I used to spend most of my time down there, so I didn't have to go back to my horrible halls, because it was horri— it was disgusting, William. You would have been appalled. You would have dragged me out of there and said, well, I cannot leave you here.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:26:21 It was horrible.

William Hanson 0:26:22 Bless. Did you— and it was a single room. Single, yeah. Single bed.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:26:26 Single bed, yeah.

William Hanson 0:26:27 And if you were to go back to uni, if we were sending you back to university, um, and you couldn't read English language, what would you read?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:26:35 Well, I was going to do what everybody in our industry does, media studies or something like that.

William Hanson 0:26:42 Was that actually a thing at the time? I thought it was more recent.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:26:46 Yeah, but I spoke to, and I hope he doesn't mind me saying this, you remember Alan Dedicoat, who came in for one of our legendary episodes? And I phoned Alan at the time and I said, I'm thinking I'm going to go to university. What should I study? And he said to me, anything but media studies. Do not study media studies.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:27:09 Because he said— and he at the time was working for Radio 2— and he said, all of the applications we get are for media studies, and we know that they will learn everything within about 2 weeks of working on the job anyway. So, we'd far rather you did something different, expanded your mind, and do anything other than that. So, that's why I did English Language and Linguistics.

William Hanson 0:27:33 And I'm going to ask a question which I think I know the answer to anyway. What did your university wardrobe look like?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:27:48 I think— well, I think you might be surprised. I think I did wear more shirts at university than a manly polo. I think a manly polo was something that I kind of came to a little later in time. But I think I wore a lot of jeans.

William Hanson 0:28:04 Oh.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:28:05 Yes.

William Hanson 0:28:05 Now, we don't see you in jeans very often.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:28:07 I've got them on today.

William Hanson 0:28:08 Oh.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:28:08 Jeans, and probably at the time, because it was the '90s, A baggy slack. A baggy slack. What did you wear? A suit?

William Hanson 0:28:20 No. How rude. No, I did wear some jackets, to be fair.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:28:22 Did you?

William Hanson 0:28:23 But not suit jackets.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:28:23 At university, you wore jackets?

William Hanson 0:28:26 Occasionally. Go to lectures. Yeah, open-neck shirts, often blue or pink. Really the only colours I can wear. Today I'm wearing both. And, yeah, jeans or a chino. Moleskine, actually. I did quite a nice number in Moleskine trousers.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:28:42 I bet you did.

William Hanson 0:28:43 In fact, actually, I've just remembered I've got some In fact, when I got this jumper that I'm wearing today, it's a pink sort of cricket jumper with a red and white or red and cream detailing, I was given some Moleskins at the same time and I hadn't— and it was basically just as we were hitting summer. I thought, well, I can't wear them now. No. I'll be able to wear them now. That's exciting.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:29:02 Beautiful.

William Hanson 0:29:03 Anyway, so exciting I can hear the phone go.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:29:05 I better get that. It's bound to be someone very important. Rollin'!

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:31:16 Welcome back, Bucketheads. We've been discussing university, and it's now time for your questions. So let's check out our heaving bags of post. Of course, if there's something on your mind that needs a luxury touch, postman@luxurypodcast.co.uk is the place for your queries and your questions. And a bit of a reminder, you can watch these episodes on Patreon if you join our Luxury Members Club. Just head over to luxurypodcast.co.uk to join.

William Hanson 0:31:44 This first one is from Richard.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:31:46 Richard! Richard!

William Hanson 0:31:48 Hello, Jonathan and William. I went to university in Stafford. which is known for its quieter, shall we say, legacy community rather than a busy student town.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:31:58 Oh.

William Hanson 0:31:58 We had one nightclub in the whole town, one Asda, a few smaller shops, and that was your lot. Not exactly the exciting experience we were promised, as you can imagine.

William Hanson 0:32:07 So for fun, we had to come up with our own ideas. One night, after doing a big shop in Asda with my friend, we were pushing our family-sized trolley and decided it would be hilarious to push this trolley down the country roads back to the halls of residence and stash said trolley in our friend's en suite bathroom. Bear in mind, this was about midnight at this point, back when supermarkets were 24 hours. So we called our friend Paul to get said friend out of his room for 10 minutes, but not to be suspicious. This gave us enough time to lug the trolley up 3 flights of stairs and through 2 heavy fire doors and onto the floor where he was staying.

William Hanson 0:32:38 Sweating and panting quietly, we pushed this ridiculous-sized trolley carefully past the kitchen where we could hear them both chatting. We pushed the trolley into his room, eased the bathroom door open, and carefully pushed the trolley in. Closing the bathroom door behind us, we scarpered back to our own rooms. Success. I was awoken that night around 3 to the landline phone in my room ringing, and forgetting about what we'd done, I assumed it was reception or something.

William Hanson 0:33:02 Picking it up, I was greeted by a lengthy mouthful of expletives, followed by, why is there a family-sized trolley in my bathroom? I know it was you, Rich! And a slam down of the phone. Safe to say I owed him a pint or two, but he saw the funny side of it the following day. My question to you both is, do you have any stories of making your own fun in university, or any pranks you would like to play on your friends to make the stress of university a little more tolerable?

William Hanson 0:33:24 Rich from Liverpool. Well, you've already talked about prank calls. It actually, when reading that, it reminded me of the thing that annoyed me that people were doing to be funny. It wasn't even funny. I don't mind a prank as long as it's funny.

William Hanson 0:33:34 They just set the fire alarm off at 3 AM when they were coming back from clubs. I was already tucked up in bed because I used to, most of the time during the Michaelmas term, the winter term, I'd watch Strictly, It Takes Two with Claudia, have some pasta, and go to bed.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:33:49 During the Michaelmas term. I feel like your university experience might have been a bit different.

William Hanson 0:33:57 I don't know if the university managed to call it the Michaelmas term, but I did.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:34:00 Who did? Yeah, it used to happen at ours as well. And we'd all have to congregate down by said security guards I mentioned earlier. And I still remember the bloke who used to come out and he used to crack the same old joke, which at 3 o'clock in the morning when you were fast asleep is not funny. Oh, more heads than beds. Always the same. Not funny. And then we'd have to file back up, and I'm fairly sure it was a similar kind of thing. In fact, sometimes I wondered if it was the security guards used to do it themselves for a bit of entertainment.

William Hanson 0:34:30 I don't think we had security. I actually don't know what would have happened had we had an issue.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:34:34 Really?

William Hanson 0:34:34 Yeah, I mean, there must have been someone in an office somewhere.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:34:37 Oh, we had security.

William Hanson 0:34:38 Did you?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:34:40 Oh yes, and they were very necessary.

William Hanson 0:34:44 Yeah, well, you were near the Roehampton Estate, weren't you?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:34:46 The Roehampton Estate, absolutely, absolutely. Oh, Francesca's been in touch. Oh, dear William and Jonathan, I've been browsing your back catalogue of episodes featuring the weekly dissection of Keeping Up Appearances and thought I'd share with you the fact that my university dissertation, for which I received a very executive first-class honours— ooh— featured the iconic television show in no small part.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:35:14 It explored class and gender through the lens of the films of Ken Loach and Mike Leigh, namely Abigail's Party, which I think you'll appreciate, as well as Keeping Up Appearances and The Good Life. I was regrettably a little bit mean to poor Hyacinth, referring to her as a monstrous woman and grotesque. But ultimately redeem her character by the end of my chapter. What did you both write your dissertations on, if you did one? Thanks for all the laughs, Francesca.

William Hanson 0:35:48 Gosh. Well, I mean, look, Francesca, first of all, I would say don't worry too much about how you described Hyacinth, because I think it's how the late Dame Patricia described her, as a monster. So, you were sort of— you're fine on that part. I did my dissertation On— because I had to do something at the end of year 2 as well. I get them mixed up, but I'm fairly sure I did it on you and non-you.

William Hanson 0:36:11 So, that's upper-class speech or non-upper-class speech and lavatory, toilet, etc. And I had to interview various people from upper-class backgrounds and not upper-class backgrounds. I think it was something— I can't— don't ask me the title. I can't remember it, but the language choice of the British upper classes today, you and non-you, does it still matter? Or something like that.

William Hanson 0:36:32 That's what I did it on. I don't even know if I still have it.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:36:34 I did mine on, I think it was something to do with, um, what does your accent say about you?

William Hanson 0:36:40 So similar.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:36:42 And what do people, uh, assume about you because of your accent?

William Hanson 0:36:48 Ah.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:36:48 And so I recorded lots of different people. Janice, who was from Somerset, she was from Yeovil, so she spoke like that.

William Hanson 0:36:57 Roshik.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:36:57 And then, uh, who, who else did I have? My flatmate Ruth, the one from Wigan who could use a urinal.

William Hanson 0:37:03 Yep.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:37:04 Um, who else did I have? I had a Welsh speaker. I had Cockney Kate. I think she did a bit of Cockney for us.

William Hanson 0:37:12 From Crawley.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:37:13 Crawley, Crawley Cockney. Um, had a bit of Jamaican patois. I mean, I don't know whether you'd be able to do this now, but I went around then and I played the same little excerpt of something.

William Hanson 0:37:27 Were they all reading the same text?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:37:28 All reading the same text in their different language. And I asked a selection of people from Harpenden to rate them out of 10 for things like intelligence, trustworthiness, decency, all that kind of stuff.

William Hanson 0:37:46 Did you have to do PEGEX?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:37:47 What?

William Hanson 0:37:48 PEGEX.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:37:49 What's that?

William Hanson 0:37:50 Point, example, explanation.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:37:51 Oh, Probably. I don't know.

William Hanson 0:37:53 So you make your point, e.g., then you give an example, and then you explain it. PEGX.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:37:58 Probably. It rings a bell now you say it. I kind of blocked all of that side out.

William Hanson 0:38:03 I don't know how I got through essays.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:38:04 All of mine were done through the night. I just used to kind of leave everything for the last minute and then think, oh, I better write that. And then I'd start at about 11 o'clock at night and still be working on it at 5 o'clock in the morning.

William Hanson 0:38:15 Wow.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:38:15 Terrible.

William Hanson 0:38:16 No.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:38:16 You're not going to get the best out of someone at 5 AM, are you?

William Hanson 0:38:24 Give it a go. Jack's been in touch. He says, hi boys, if you had to choose a course for the other person to study, what would it be?

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:38:32 Oh. Oh. Oh, for you, needlework and tapestry.

William Hanson 0:38:37 DIY. The thing is, I'd love that, yeah.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:38:40 For me, geography. Geography?

William Hanson 0:38:46 Because then you can realise that there are more places to go on holiday than Frigiliana or Florida. Or Fort Ventura!

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:38:53 Oh dear! Well, do you know what? On that bombshell— Yes. I think that'll do for today.

William Hanson 0:38:58 That will do.

Jonathan Vernon-Smith 0:38:58 We will of course be back tomorrow for another one of our luxury bonus episodes, but until then—

William Hanson 0:39:04 Goodbye!