MSA-UK

Service and Facilities

Published under section Student Information by Webmaster

17 April 2007

Once you have sorted out the main issues like accommodation, banking and healthcare, it is time to think about the day-to-day issues, Such as where can I find the local mosques and the prayer times, what the best supermarket? Where can you buy good winter cloths? Where can you go for a nice meal?

6.1 Islamic information
6.2 Freshers
6.3 National Union of Students (NUS)
6.4 Shopping
6.5 Restaurants
6.6 Telephones
6.7 Skype
6.8 E-mail
6.9 Television and radio
6.10 Postal services
6.11 Water and gas
6.12 Disability

6.1 Islamic information

Please refer to the specialized page on Islamic information in our website, for details of how to find you nearest mosque, the prayer times, halal meat stores and so on.

6.2 Freshers

As a student you will have a lot of things you can do during your free time and so on. In the first week of term, most of the universities and colleges hold the Freshers Faire, a programme of social events for new students. During the fair you will have further opportunities to meet other students, and you can join societies like Islamic society, sign up for cheap discount on various publications and so on.

MSA (UK) will hold a Freshers faire normally during the second weekend of term in London. What better way can there be than to meet up with fellow Maldivian students, both new and continuing, and exchange various information and have a great time together! During the fair there will be sessions of giving useful orientation information about student life in UK, and there will be sight seeing sessions, games and food!

6.3 National Union of Students (NUS)

NUS is a campaigning organization that represents the interest of all the students in the UK. All universities and most of the larger colleges have a students union, which are local branches of NUS. You are, by default a member of NUS unless you decide to opt out. As a member of NUS you are entitled to all the privileges and discounts offered to NUS members. This includes discounts at high street shops, discounts on public transport, flights and so on. You can find a list of companies that offer discounts to NUS members are listed on the website of NUS: www.nusonline.co.uk

The contact details of NUS are as follows:

The National Union of Students
461 Holloway Road
London
N7 6LJ
Phone: +44(0)2075616500, +44(0)2072728900,
Fax: +44(0)2072635713
Email: nusuk@nus.org.uk

6.4 Shopping

As a student you need to be very careful on making sure you do sensible shopping! Given below is a rough list of the most popular UK shops.

6.4.1 Food

The major supermarkets: Include Tesco, Sainsbury, Asda, Morrisons, Waitrose. You can also find smaller shops specialing in international foods, such as Indian foods.

The typical opening times: For supermarkets are 8:00am to 8:00pm (or 10:00pm) Monday to Saturday, and 10:00am-4:00pm (or 5:00pm) on Sunday. There are also a small number of 24 hour supermarkets in most of these supermarket chains.

Tips: Store's own brands (such as "bettabuy" in Morrisons "Economy" in Sainsbury's, ""smart price" in Asda, are cheaper compared to branded foods

6.4.2 Clothing

Major chains include: Next, Monsoon, River Island, Topman, Topshop.

Typical opening hours: 9:00am to 5:30pm (6:00pm) Monday to Saturday, with some shops opening on Sundays especially in major cities and shopping centres. There are also ‘late opening' nights one or two days a week when the shops are open until 9:00pm or 10:00pm.

Tips: Major sales occur during Christmas and Summer

Charity shops such as Oxfam, Cancer Research, British Heart Foundation etc have high-quality used clothing at very cheap prices

Large chains like Primark and TK Maxx sell high-quality cloths and cheap prices

Also, supermarkets such as Asda and Tesco sell their own clothing in their stores, which may be relatively cheap

6.4.3 Department Stores

Major Chains include: Debenhams, Bhs, John Lewis, Marks & Spencer, Woolworths

Opening times: Similar to clothing shops as given in section 6.4.2

Tips: They sell not only clothing, but household goods such as bed linen, towels, kitchen utensils etc

Major clothing items such as raincoats, winter coats may be cheaper than in high street clothing shops (given in section 6.4.2)

Shops such as "Poundland", "£1 shop" many household items and stationary amongst other things can be purchased for £1.

6.4.4 Chemists/Pharmacies

Major chains include: Superdrug, Boots

Opening times: Similar to shops as given in 6.4.2

Tips: Prescription and non-prescription medicines, contraceptives, wide range of soaps, shampoos, skincare, toothpaste, hair-styling items etc

6.4.5 Books and Stationary

Major chains include: Waterstone's, books Etc these two for books), WH Smith, Rymans, Paperchase (last two for stationary)

Opening times: Similar to times given in 6.4.2

Tips: There are many independent bookshops selling new and second-hand books. Second-hand books are well suited for any task and are much cheaper.

The Student Union shops found in most of the universities and colleges have cheaper alternatives to those found in the high street.

6.4.6 Mobile Phones

Major chains include: Carphonewarhouse, Phones4U, own shops of operators such as Orange, T-mobile, Vodafone, 3, O2

Opening times: Similar to times given in section 6.4.2

Tips: There are many excellent deals which gives high quality phones for free and gives several hundred free minutes of voice call to any network at any times, plus several hundred text messages free, if you take a post-paid line. But have to vary of a high line-rental! If you opt for a pay-as-you-go (pre-paid) you only pay for what you use, there is no line rental.

6.4.7 Internet shopping

There is always the option of doing your shopping online, even if you wish to buy your groceries from your supermarket (such as Tesco). But special attention should be given to the fact that you do not get to see the item physically before you buy. One of the main sites that are internationally used for online shopping (by bidding and selling) is eBay. (www.ebay.co.uk) which is a popular site where you can buy good quality (and also new) products and relatively cheap price.

6.5 Restaurants

There are many different types of restaurants where you can venture into for a good night out. You can find plenty of India restaurants if you wish to eat food that you have back in the Maldives! Or you can try the Italian, Chinese, Japanese, Turkish or Portuguese restaurants and Café's which are found in almost all the cities in the UK.

Most restaurants display the menu outside, so that you can find out the prices before entering.

The opening times vary widely. Some restaurants are open from around 11:00am through to midnight, whist others open for a couple of hours for lunch and then close and reopen from around 6:00pm and stay open until midnight. There are also places which open only for dinner. On Sundays some restaurants may close early and some small restaurants may not even open.

Perhaps one of the most famous methods is to do a takeaway. ‘Takeaway' food is cooked food that you can buy from the restaurant and take away with you to eat at a place where you want. Food that are commonly among takeaways are Chinese meals, Indian meals kebabs (Turkish: grilled meat), burgers and pizzas. These can also be ordered to be delivered to your home, depending on how far your house is from the place to which you gave the order.

6.6 Telephones

One of the most important things you need to know about is the telephone system in the UK.

6.6.1 Public Phones

You can see public telephone booths outside on the pavements. Some of these are coin-operated and others are card-operated., where you need either a credit card or a special phone card, which you can buy from newsagents, post offices and supermarkets.

6.6.2 Useful numbers

Given below are some of the most important numbers you need to know, when you are in K.

Emergency services: 999 (for police, fire and ambulance)
Domestic (UK) operator: 100 (dial this number if you want to reverse the charges for a call, i.e., the person whom you are calling pays, or make a person-to-person call, i.e., you pay only if you reach the exact person you want to call)
Directory enquiries in UK: 118 500 or 118 118 (have to pay a premium rate if you enquire by telephone, but its free if enquired through the internet: www.bt.com/directory-enquireies and www.yell.com)
International dialing code: 00
International operator: 155
International directory enquiries: 118 505 (calls cost £1.50 per minute)

6.6.3 Mobile Phones

As mentioned before, there are different types of mobile phone packages. These are pay-monthly plans, pre-paid plans and pay-as-you-go plans

Pay-monthly plans: under this plan, you have to sing a contract with a mobile network or service provider for a duration, usually 12 months or 18months. You choose a tariff (fee structure) from a range of choices offered by the network and you get monthly bills from the network provider.
Pre-paid plans: In this plan you sign a contract with a network or service provider and pay for a period or 12months service in advance, at a cheaper rate than for monthly plans. However if you use for more than the agreed amount of minutes you are billed
Pay-as-you-go: This plan enables you to have full control over your calls. In other words you cannot go over the amount of money you spend on the credit (talk time) you purchased.

6.7 Skype

Perhaps one of the best options to talk freely (or cheaply) if you and the other person have access to the internet and have skype installed (which is free).

6.8 E-mail

Most universities and colleges will provide free email accounts for their students. If they do not, it is still advisable to have your own email account, such as a hotmail, gmail or yahoo account.

6.9 Television and radio

You can buy a TV set for about £50-£75.

In the UK, if you want to watch TV, you have to pay TV license every year (currently it is about £135 per year). This will give you the free national channels, i.e., BBC1 BBC 2, ITV1, Channel 4, and Channel 5. Now there are freeview boxes, which you can buy as cheap as £10 and connected to your TV set. This will give you lots of free channels which are very useful and entertaining. There are good children channels as well on freeview.

You can also install a commercial package such as Sky which is at a basic price of £15 per month, and if you want to watch lots of sport, you have to pay more for it.

The famous radio channels offered by the national broadcaster, BBC, are, Radio 1,2,3,4 and Five Live.

For more information on BBC Radio and TV visit their website: www.bbc.co.uk

6.10 Postal services

If you have to send something by post you have to find a post office or a post box. Post offices are normally open from 9:00am to 5:30pm Monday to Friday and 9:00am to 12:30pm on Saturdays. Post offices are closed on Sundays. You can buy posting stamps (1^st class or 2^nd class) from newsagents and supermarkets and from special vending machines placed near post offices.

There are four main ways to send a letter:

First-class post. First Class mail usually delivers your letter or packet the next working day, including Saturday. It costs just 32p for letters and small items weighing up to 100g.
Second class post: Many people use Second Class mail every day to send Letters, Packets and other small items. It costs just 23p for Letters and small items weighing up to 100g and your mail is normally delivered by the third working day after posting.
Recorded Signed for: Recorded Signed For have several advantages, such as, excellent value at just 68p plus normal postage, peace of mind with proof of postage, use online tracking to check if your item has been delivered, a signature is obtained upon delivery, and next working day delivery for most First Class Recorded items
Special delivery: guaranteed next day delivery for UK destination and is the most expensive. Thus sue this only if the item is extremely urgent. It also gives online tracking and has a huge compensation amount.

For more information of postal services visit www.postoffice.co.uk and www.royalmail.com

6.11 Water and gas

In the UK it is safe to drink the tap water from the mains supply, which is usually the cold tap in the kitchen. Better to avoid drinking from any other tap in any place unless a clear sign saying "Drinking water" is placed near it.

As for swimming, unlike in Maldives we cannot access the beach as easily as back home. However, as an island nation there are many beaches and a continuing tradition of seaside activities in the UK. You are advised to check with the local authorities before swimming in the sea or rives and lakes since pollution level sometimes rise above the recommended limits.

With regard to gas, it is widely used in the UK for cooking and heating. There are some basic precautions regarding usage of gas. They are, remember to read the safety instructions before using the appliance, never to block off ventilation pipes or hatches and to call gas emergencies on 0800 111 999 if you smell gas (do not use any form of flame or electric switch in this case)

You also have to make sure that gas or electric heaters, fires and cookers are checked by a professional annually, and whenever you go out remember to turn off gas and electricity appliances such as cookers, TV and iron.

6.12 Disability

In the UK, the Disability discrimination Act 1995 obliges universities and colleges to have certain legal obligations towards students who have ay kind of disability. Furthermore, many modern buildings have disabled people's access such as wheelchair lifts and ramps, and many buses on public transport have wheelchair access.

For further information contact the following agencies:

RADAR (royal Association for Disability and Rehabilitation)
Tel: +44(0) 2072503222
Fax: +44(0) 207250 0212
Website: www.radar.org.uk

SKILL (National Bureau for Students with Disabilities)
Tel: +44(0) 2074500620
Fax: +44(0) 2074500650
Website: www.skill.org.uk

Disability rights Commission
Tel: +44(0) 8457622633
Fax: +44(0) 8457778878
Website: www.drc-gb.org

Disability Law Service
Tel: +44(0) 2077919800
Fax: +44(0) 2077919802
Website: www.dls.org.uk