Student Life Diary
Dianaimh Ward is in her final year at Queen's University, Belfast studying Music and Anthropology. We have been following her life since she started university in September 2001. Find out how she's getting on each week as she submits another entry into her diary


Diary entry 31
"Well who would have thought it would end so quickly! This time 3 years ago I was sweating over my a-level results. Now this week I'm counting the hours to my final final!"
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Diary entry 30
"I think after having absolutely no exams in January, Queens is playing a cruel trick on me making me wait as long as possible for my exams to start and finish. I had my first (and only) written exam this week, a couple of days after the girls had their last exams! It was so awful this week having to try and revise knowing everyone else is finished!"
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Diary entry 29
"Two modules down two to go! I’m more or less on the home straight now and I just wish my exams were sooner. I don’t mean I can’t wait for them, I mean I can’t wait for them to be over! After handing in a handful of coursework I’m now left with my anthropology exam and music recital. It mightn’t seem like much but once you actually start to study for them it soon becomes apparent just how little I’ve done this semester!"
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Diary entry 28
"You’d think that the last week of school would be a care-free time to relax before the impending exams! But no why would I ever have a bit of piece and quite?! My first priority this week was to get my research report for anthropology done by Tuesday and instead of doing research during the Easter hols I did it the day before!"
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Diary entry 27
"It scares me that in the past week I’ve spent more time in the music department than I have at home! It’s been a mixture of lying about complaining to my class mates about the exams and actually working!
If it wasn’t for the fact that next week is my last week of class I think you would find me at the bottom of a bottle in the students union!" more

Diary entry 26
"I don’t know why I do it to myself but I tried to be a little goody two-shoes this week for one of my music modules. Part of my music degree at Queen’s is performance practise so I thought it would be a great idea to get used to playing in front of an audience and when the BBC were looking for some volunteers for a ‘Music Live’ gig Niall and I thought it would be great!" more

Diary entry 25
"After our little spending spree on alcohol this week we were glad to have already bought our Eric Clapton tickets when he played the Odyssey this weekend. It was a great show and really class to hear him live but the best thing of all was the unusual crowd. It was full of parents and their kids so it was quite a mellow crowd, enough so that I could sneak up to the front without pushing to see an all time legend!"
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Diary entry 24
"Much as I love holidays I hate how guilty they can make you feel. As I finish my second week of hols guess who hasn’t bother to do any work which doesn’t involve watching either ‘Neighbours’ or ‘Eastenders’? Yes of course typical Dianaimh when everyone else is working hard I’m lying in my bed all day!" more

Diary entry 23
"Despite it being the first week of holidays I decided that instead of lying about (which I do anyway) I would at least try and do some work. That plan kind of went out the window when I started spending most of the week in the students union with Niall, Mark and Nicola! Admittedly it wasn’t planned we just took a notion but as you can imagine I didn’t get much schoolwork done!" more

Diary entry 22
"I think this week will go down in recorded history as being my worst ever week at school. It just so happened that all my lecturers decided to make me hand in coursework within days of each other, I had a lunchtime recital to practise for and the QUB orchestra concert was also this week. I have never needed alcohol so badly!!!" more

Diary entry 21
"With just over a week to go until the Easter holidays I’ve already tried to get into the holiday routine of never getting out of bed (unless it’s to watch ‘Neighbours’!), but for some strange reason this week I’ve actually had to get up and do some work." more

Diary entry 20
Dianaimh broke the habit of a lifetime and wore a dress for the psychology formal at Queen's. She managed to have a great night without getting sozzled. She didn't celebrate St Patrick's Day as planned, due to the fact that "the off licence for a carry out because I don’t think they’ll accept invisible money!!!" more

Diary entry 19
"Having complained about not having money for the last three years (!) I’ve suddenly decided to throw caution to the wind and just dig well into my overdraft. At least if I’m gonna be poor I may as well be REALLY poor but with some" more


Have a look back at the diary entries from Dianaimh's winter term.