Moving tips for students – or Lucinda’s essentials

I have moved house seven times in five years for university or for work. In three countries, I have lived in halls of residence, student housing, a family home on the other side of the world, and a flat in the centre of a vibrant city. This means I have packed a lot of bags, a skill which has improved over time (my parents can testify that my packing skills in my first year of university were shocking). It also means that I have learnt a lot about the things worth packing for that first week of living somewhere, when everything is too chaotic to get to a shop before the weekend.

(I measure my life in suitcases. )

1. Tea

I love my cup of tea in the morning. In fact, it goes further than that: I need one cup to pass as vaguely human, and then a second cup half an hour later to become functioning and friendly. I know I can’t be the only one in this situation, so tea bags (or coffee, if that’s your thing) are an essential part of the moving process. I have stashed extra strong tea bags in my suitcase going anywhere from Canterbury to Spain, and even had them sent over by my enduringly patient mother in a care package (which also contained cream crackers and bras – yet more essentials).

If you are travelling in the morning, what bringing tea means is that once you have fallen in through the front door, heaved your suitcases up any stairs and then dropped them onto the bedroom floor with a mixture of exhaustion from the journey and trepidation for the coming year, you can settle in immediately by sticking the kettle on and feeling a little bit more at home.

If you are an afternoon or evening traveller, it might be that all the shops are closed by the time you reach your new accommodation. That might not seem such a tragedy when you first arrive, but when the next morning arrives and you are either still tired from yesterday’s travelling or hungover from meeting your new housemates (or both), you will regret not having thought ahead. Trust me, for your sake – pack the tea.

2. Pasta

It may sound like a cliché, but pasta is the lifeblood of students. Whether it is a Sunday evening and everything is closed, an ungodly hour after a night out, or you have blown through your weekly food budget on a few nights out (we have all been there), pasta is the culinary saviour of the underprepared.

The best thing about pasta, other than that it doesn’t go off if you forget about it for a while, is just how incredibly versatile it is. It is a strong base for pretty much any sauce or selection of ingredients you can throw at it: meat, fish, vegetables, or even just butter with a touch of salt and a grating of blck pepper. Many times, when I have been too tired (or broke) to go food shopping, I have relied on spaghetti aglio olio pepperoncino to get me through the evening – this is potentially the easiest recipe you can make, consisting (as the name translates as) of garlic, oil and chilli flakes. Could not be simpler or more delicious.

I have eaten pasta three times this week alone and never with the same ingredients: you can make bold arrabiata, filling tuna pasta salad, comforting lasagne, or something more experimental. My macaroni a la huancaína is a staple in my household, and is something of an Italian/Peruvian fusion: homemade amarillo chilli and cheese sauce with pasta, some sliced tomatoes or asparagus strewn over the top before hitting the oven. One of my favourite winter dishes is from a Nigella Lawson cookbook, and is consists of pappardelle with butternut squash, onions, sage and wine, and with strong blue cheese crumbled over the top to ooze meltingly into the sweet-savoury sauce. It is utterly delicious and always seems very impressive, despite being super easy.

(A dignified eater I am not, but there are few pleasures greater than eating pasta directly from the pan. )

Pasta also means cooking for people becomes a simple affair when you want to have your friends over for dinner; bakes or lasagnes/cannelloni mean everything can be bunged into one large pan and brought to the table with a bottle of wine. Sorted.

3. Tinned legumes

Black beans, baked beans, lentils, chickpeas … Another store cupboard standby which you will find indispensable in times of need. And when I say need, I mean when it is raining and you don’t want to go outside or when you need a protein-filled lunch to see you through an afternoon of lectures and an evening of society meetings with no break. Like pasta, the joy of tinned legumes is that they can sit quite happily in the cupboard for months just waiting for their time to shine. And believe me, that time will come.

If you have lots of stairs to climb, you may want to put them in a separate bag to avoid your suitcases getting too heavy, but those stairs are another reason having them in the house is a must. During my last stint in Barcelona, I lived on the third floor of one building and worked on the seventh floor of another. That’s a lot of stairs to climb. On an average day, I would climb the seven floors to work twice, and probably climb up to my flat anywhere between two and three times. Add in a session at the gym, and I was often knackered at the end of the day. What I learnt from this is to always have the wherewithal to make a quick dinner or snack in the house, without fear of anything having started to mould. I was not willing to make another trip down the stairs, out to the closest shop, and then drag myself back up to my flat one more time – and even if I could find the motivation, my thighs would have just given out on me by that point, anyway.

With tinned legumes, you already have the basis for any hearty meal: baked beans on a jacket potato, hummus, vegan ragú (I ate a lot of this in the cold Barcelona winter, making enough to bring in for lunch the next day), or just my too-ill-to-chew staple: lentil soup.

I understand that if you are moving abroad, perhaps packing tins isn’t the most practical way of utilising suitcase space (although I packed sixteen baby cans of slimline tonic and a set of fairy lights last time I moved out of England): in which case, make it one of the first things you buy. Another brilliant aspect of the humble bean or lentil: they are ecstatically cheap.

4. Paracetamol

This is so obvious it almost goes without saying, but it is also one of those things people tend to forget in the last-minute rush of getting out the door and moving to their new life. Paracetamol will be your saviour – especially if you are a student and have to drag yourself through the party-every-night chaos that is Freshers Week. Honestly, I find packing and unpacking so stressful anyway that I normally get a headache twenty minutes after arriving at my new home and realising just how much stuff now needs to be put away. This is where the tea (mentioned above) also comes in handy.

(Late night dancing during my Freshers Week way back when... one of those nights before the morning after. A painkiller, a cup of tea and a bacon sandwich came to the rescue, though).

Whether it is for a hangover when you have an early lecture, aching muscles after pushing it too hard at the gym, or just stress-headaches from all the upheaval, you will be grateful you have these in your suitcase.

5. Personal touches

This can be your iPod, a stuffed toy, your favourite mug, a photograph, or anything that makes you feel just a little bit more at home on your first night in a new place. I have a plastic folder of a few pictures: snapshots with friends and family, postcards from my travels, the occasional nice birthday cards people have sent me. I put these on a wall or door and my room is transformed – at least in my eyes – from an empty, characterless room in a strange place into my little haven, surrounded by memories with loved ones. I know, it might sound a bit twee, but it will be a real comfort. Or, if you bring along your own music (plus something to plug it into, which is a point I recently forgot), you can stick on some upbeat music and get that unpacking/organising/making lists of what you forgot done a lot quicker and more easily. Plus, it will remind you that wherever you are in the world – and no matter how far from where you came – you can always have a dance in your bedroom. That’s universal.

(Art, photos I have taken, pictures with friends and family: a touch of the familiar)

Photo gallery