Before I got here, I had everything planned out: on the first day of Freshers’ Week, I would drop my books while rushing through Cloister Court. As I bent to retrieve my copy of Wuthering Heights, someone would reach for it at the same time. In a slow-motion sequence, we would lock eyes and realise we had been lovers in a past-life. Suffice to say, this did not happen. My Freshers’ Week consisted of earnest discussions about unconscious bias and the dawning realisation that meeting someone in the wild is considered a modern miracle. BUT the Richard Curtis fan inside me will not give up so easily, and I have searched far and wide to learn all there is to know about the spots where these miracle encounters happen. In short, I seek to pass onto you the wisdom of many a delulu student before you. I trust that you will put it to good use.

Random

Let’s start with the truly random. Not the ‘bumping into someone in the buttery queue’ type of random. I mean the sort that makes you wonder whether a benevolent screenwriter with a preference for casting Hugh Grant is quietly pulling the strings: like tumbling off your bike on King’s Parade and falling for the stranger who helps you up, or accidentally breaking into your future partner’s house because your forgot your friend’s house number. These are not the kinds of meet cutes that you can premeditate, and indeed, I would strongly advise you not to. Doing so could either end in an incriminating Camfess, or a restraining order. That said, a friend of mine swears by coffeeshops for chance encounters. The trick is to sit near an attractive solo studier and feign outrage at the price of an aggressively average latte. Approach with caution. Some people are genuinely there to work.

“The Richard Curtis fan inside me will not give up so easily”

Partying

Now to a slightly more trodden path: the drunken encounter. For many students this is hardly the setting for serious business. However, I do know some couples whose whirlwind romance first sparked on the sticky polystyrene floor of a college bop. For others, (whose names I will kindly spare) sparks initially flew in the smoking area of Revs. This is hardly surprising: by the time you find yourself there, the drinks have started to wear off and you wonder why you agreed to be trapped in a cloud of sweat for the past half hour in the first place – this serves as a surprisingly effective facilitator of connection.

Common interests

We tend to gravitate towards people who we share a passion with: Olivia Coleman and Ed Sinclair famously crossed paths while performing in a Footlights production. So, sign up to that salsa class, that improv workshop, or even that Port and Policy meeting (actually, maybe not that one). The key is to go alone, if you must, and to show up expecting to have fun, then you’ll have nothing to lose. DO NOT, and I repeat DO NOT sign up for something just because everyone else is. There is nothing worse than being surrounded by a euphoric mob, wondering whether you alone are chemically incapable of caring about blind wine tasting.

These meetings don’t have to happen in societies. A friend from Corpus told me how, when he first met his girlfriend in Freshers’, she hadn’t given him a second look – astonishing, I know – until she asked around for a guitarist to accompany her dreams of singing Carrie Underwood. Guess who turned up at her door with an electric guitar and a wide-brimmed hat? If that doesn’t make you want to start a band, I don’t know what will. But seriously, go to an event or two of your own volition. If nothing else, it’s character building.

“Course-cest can turn sour when you share a supervision with the person that’s been leaving you on delivered for the last week”

Academic romance

Given our workload, it is hardly surprising that we tend to get close to our course mates. Be warned though, course-cest can turn sour when you share a supervision with the person that’s been leaving you on delivered for the last week. But, of course, the academic romance isn’t limited to your subject. Some might even say that the college library has become the primary hunting ground for a particular subspecies of Nat Sci: one who only appears when they are dressed to the nines and then spends a suspicious amount of time perusing the English Literature section.

Friends to lovers

This one is controversial. Just to be clear, I am not encouraging you to make a move on someone in your friendship group: a high-risk game that could bring you the love of your life, or the worst Week Five blues known to man! Instead, I urge you to stick to the friends-of-friends formula. Who better to choose your partner than someone who knows your brunch order by heart?

After sifting through the origin stories of many successful couples, one common denominator emerges: be open to spontaneity. A meet-cute rarely needs staging – it simply requires a mildly terrifying step outside your comfort zone when making the first move. Expect these opportunities to come around every day, and when they do, don’t dismiss them as reckless or assume your phone is the safer option. Why not trust your intuition over an algorithm? If you see someone attractive in public and they smile at you, then talking to them isn’t being delusional – it’s being proactive.