In 2010, Ben Fagan left a message hidden in his Wellington university hostel. A decade later, someone found it.
“Watch out for the private school kids,” my high school English teacher told us before we left for university. “They’ve never known freedom, so they go off the rails when they move away”. One of the many pieces of advice I received as a young person leaving home.
When I started studying at Victoria University of Wellington, I was housed with 389 other first-year students in a brand new university hall called Te Puni Village. It was only in its second year of operation. The corridors, living spaces and rooms were clinically clean and fresh. It was owned by the university so was decorated with committee-designed posters and fresh pamphlets advertising the facilities.
Many of my fellow residents had also made the move from up the east coast. Hawke’s Bay Tourism once ran a series of ads on the backs of buses in Wellington that read: “Hey Wellington, when we grow up, we want to be like you.” It’s a Goldilocks city, not too big, not too small, and the 13 halls of residence are considered a good stepping stone to living independently.
The rooms at Te Puni were simple, but nice. A single bed, side table, desk, cupboard with no door, and a window. There was a good side of the building to be on, and a bad side. Rooms on one side survey all of Wellington, the rolling clouds, the glittering lights, Matairangi directly opposite. Rooms on the other side overlook the carpark and survey the ambulances that pull up when someone needs their stomach pumped on a Saturday night. I was on the carpark side.
There were residential assistants (RAs) on each floor, older students who received free food and board. They were responsible for shutting down parties and injecting a bit of culture. Team building events were organised, crafternoons, there was an open mic. They even banged pots and pans outside our rooms at 6am and got us all down to the adjoining field. Unlike in the movies though, instead of a rigorous morning of hazing we just milled about for a bit then wandered back inside for breakfast.
Several friends of mine pursued their education in Dunedin, where they are much more committed to their initiations. Otago University seems to have a knack for creating traditions. Down south, PhD students are given a chocolate fish when they graduate, medical students get a book of Glenn Colquhoun poetry, and student flats have historic names.
On one memorable trip down to Dunedin I stayed with my friend Luis. He was in a university hall too, Knox College. Knox was founded in 1909 and is “one of New Zealand’s oldest and best-known residential colleges”. Sleeping on Luis’s floor was like squatting in a school for wizards. Staircases curve around between the levels, there’s a dining hall and turrets, they have grand traditions like dress-up dinners, historic titles, and a correct way to pass the salt (using your left hand only).
In Luis’s room at Knox there was a cupboard, and in that cupboard every person over the previous few decades had written their name and the years they had spent in that room. The cupboard was falling apart but I was deeply impressed by the history. I returned to my shiny new hostel determined that two years into Te Puni’s history, I would start some sort of tradition.
I took the idea of writing names in the cupboards to Te Puni’s facilities manager, and he told me there was no way that he could approve vandalism of university property. However, if they found any such graffiti in my room once I had left, they would turn a blind eye. So in the final hours of my year in Te Puni, while we were packing our bags and preparing ourselves for flatting life, I encouraged all my friends to write their names somewhere in their rooms, suggesting they add a message to the next occupant as well. We didn’t have cupboards with doors, so I scribbled something in vivid under my desk and tumbled out into the big wide world.
Eleven years went by, and I received a Facebook message. “Hey! i’m in te puni and i was going for a sick nap and saw your message under my rooms table. that’s so cool! it’s like a time capsule hahahahah. i tried to email your email you put on the table but it bounced back so i did a bit of digging and still wanted to send this message somewhere so i found this instead haha. but yeah, hi! i’m jessie, first year, and i’m in room 905 for 2021, 11 years since you would of been here.”
Jessie (I’ve changed her name) was up for a chat and had questions for me. “how’s your life going? it’s been 11 years so i’m guessing youre married? have kids even? that’s wack. well. there not just ur time capsule there also one from 2019, where on the closet side there’s O week stickers stuck in a row from 2019, 2020 and now my year 2021, which i think it’s really cool. have other people from other years contacted you? or noticed?”
She was the first, or at least the first to reach out on social media after trying my embarrassing childhood email address. I answered Jessie’s questions, and shared my thoughts on tradition. She was excited to hear from me.
“holy cow!! yo yo yoo! i didn’t expect you to message back! that’s so cool :))) thank you for all the info about past Te Puni, i think it has a lot more soul now :)) that is so cool that you got people to write in their rooms, truly so cool! my friends and i are going around looking under our desks now to find messages hehe, really cute! :))”
Jessie and I had a great chat. She threw in lots of good lines to make me feel old like “wow the history!!” and “I would of been 8 years old omfg”. She asked if I had any pictures of my time at uni and we exchanged photos of identical looking toga parties.
I found the accommodation handbook I received in 2010, and compared it with the one provided to current residents of the hall. Each speaks to the time. The 2010 handbook lists extensive “telephone extensions” for common rooms on every floor of the buildings. The 2026 handbook details what to do in the event of an active armed offender.
Despite all those 19-year-olds moving away from their communities and support networks, sticking them in huge lecture-theatres to be regularly graded and expecting everyone to learn, there is no mention of mental health in the 2010 handbook. The closest we got is a recommendation to speak to the RAs if experiencing “homesickness”. The 2010 handbook advises they will contact your parents only in the context of “serious misconduct” or financial issues, while the 2026 handbook encourages ongoing communication with family to support the transition to university life.
Jessie and I were messaging during the Covid times, so we resolved to organise a visit once Te Puni was taking visitors again. Various lockdowns later, I checked in at the end of the year. I wanted to know if they had started any traditions of their own, and wondered how her experience at the hall had been.
Jessie replied “Hi! i hope you are going well too :)) I’m stuck in Auckland at the moment unfortunately as that’s my hometown 😞 And i’ve actually moved [floors] as i got bullied on floor 9 unfortunately. I’m not really sure when i’ll be back down but i’ll try make it work :))”
Jessie had been caught in the Great Auckland Lockdown of August 2021. So she had not been back to Wellington for months when I messaged. She had left my old room some time ago due to being bullied, shifting to another floor on the other side of the building. All up, not a good experience, and no inclination to carry on any traditions.
Despite Te Puni Village being almost brand new, my peers and I did a solid job of dirtying up the place. One time paint was splashed around a corridor, terrible things happened in the elevators, and the microwave on our floor suffered a year of two-minute noodles with minimal wiping. Many of us had the urge to make the space our own. We hid away from roaring southerlies and found kindred spirits.
True to their word, the facilities manager of Te Puni gave me my bond back and didn’t hunt me down for vandalism. In three years, teenagers conceived in my first year will be starting university. Whoever is in room 905 of the Edge building this year, take a look under your desk and if you feel inclined to do so, send me a message.
