Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

As it is now exactly 50 years since I left CH, I think things may have changed a little e.g there were no "New Deps" in my time.

My son, Jonathan, is starting as a New Dep in September and is very much looking forward already to his induction in the Summer (tickets for travel have already been procured!) As yet, we have received no official information (other than dates) from the school, but we feel that recent or present pupils may have some additional material that might be either helpful to him, of general interest to the forum or just funny.

We look forward to reading your advice which will, no doubt, help to equip this young man from a tiny and remote Cornish village for the rigours of Housey.

CH started taking on new deps regularly during my time at CH. They seemed to fit in quite quickly and I don't remember there being too many problems. There was a little bit of resentment (but only from some) that they hadn't "done time like the rest of us" but it shouldn't matter. As your son is starting at the almost the top of the school he shouldn't have to go through any bullying of the kind we suffered in our first few years. My advice is to be yourself and use all the amazing facilities as much as possible. I sometimes wish I had access to all the stuff CH has to offer such as a free gym, squash courts, internet, education etc... I hope your son has a great time - deps & grecians are definitely the best time to be at CH !

He will start at the top of a house and then he gets to stay in the holiday homes at the top of the Quarter Mile - very cushy!

He'll have fun!

yeah.
when ive got more time to respond (i.e when essays re done!) ill write a long and full response to this...

holiday ho,mes?? I hae never heard them being called that!

Sophie wrote:holiday ho,mes?? I hae never heard them being called that!

Well I had a good look around when it was my mum's 50th party in there...

I had a quick look when people first moved in as well... what amazes me is how much room - priveleges, comfort there is.... - they are said to prepare people for uni - people who designed them obviousyl haven't seen university halls...

er .................................... what's a bocker, please?

DavebytheSea wrote:er .................................... what's a bocker, please?

A member of the catering/cleaning/maintenance staff. I have absolutely no idea where the word originated, and so don't know whether it is (or was supposed to be) derogatory, but was certainly in common usage amongst pupils when I was there, and I guess still is.

DavebytheSea wrote:er .................................... what's a bocker, please?

Further to the post explaining - I believe it is old Sussex slang which was appropriated by CH...

dogger wrote:because this is not the place - go to a chat room if you want to run people down .

and there was me thinking this was 'General Chat - CH Stuff'. d'oh! so misleading. anyone no where i can find one of these 'chat rooms'?
[stir, stir, stir ]

definitely agree about making use of facilities. especially free theatre access, free sauna access, free pool access. damn, we had it all....... /

new deps do tend to fit in fine. some try too hard to fit in. some of them during my time were really arrogant (probably as result). so basically, if he is relaxed and goes with the flow, he should be fine!

DavebytheSea wrote:er .................................... what's a bocker, please?

I'm surprised you don't recall the bockers, they were normally seen wandering around with a handcart, smoking a roll-up and cleaning the bogs.