Submitted by Harry Lewis on the 2016 winter session program in London, England sponsored by the Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice..
My first week in London was a whirlwind to say the least. It’s hard to believe that in a few short hours, I will have already finished a quarter of my study abroad experience. Time certainly flies when you’re having fun! Already I find myself grumbling at tourists walking in circles around the Underground as if I were a native-born Englishman. I’m proud to say I have yet to have any near misses with motor vehicles, as I think I’ve gotten the hang of looking towards oncoming traffic speeding towards you from the opposite direction. In some ways, I’ve become so much a part of the city atmosphere, the constant ebb and flow of people and traffic, that I’m slightly loathe to stop moving at all. Some nights when I finally lay down, I feel as if I’m still swinging with the motion of the Tube. Even in those brief moments when I stop to rest it’s as if I can’t shake the sense of being constantly on the go.
I don’t think that sense is a bad thing per se, but it’s definitely a change from Delaware which in comparison seems quiet. People in London know exactly where they’re going and why they’re going there which is quite a change from the often directionless walking that I’m used to back on campus. There’s no such thing as a meandering walk unless you’re in a park somewhere. Everyone has a purpose and they stop at nothing to make sure that purpose is satisfied. In a lot of ways, I find the city and I have similar personalities – constantly moving, never stopping to take a breath, but barreling onward towards the next task at hand.
It’s that sense that every moment on this program is so precious that I forget sometimes. Like everyone else on a study abroad program, I feel the pressure to pack as much into my stay here as physically possible. Even in the London rain, I’m perfectly happy to run all over the city taking in the sights, absorbing the culture, and even – dare I admit it? – trying a beef and kidney pie. But those moments where time slows to a halt are for me the most precious. Standing in the National Gallery in front of Leonardo da Vinci’s famous sketch of the Madonna with no one else around was a breathtaking experience.
Looking out over the English Channel and catching a glimpse of France from the cliffs of Dover was stunning.
I spend a lot of time with my group, and I love them dearly, but it’s these quiet moments by myself that I find to be the most poignant. It’s then that I can take a breath, step back, and let it hit me: that I am in one of the most beautiful cities in the world, that I am experiencing life in all its beauty and that I am so impossibly lucky.