Tag: austineliasdj

By austineliasdejesus

I don't know how, but my time studying abroad is over. My time as a study abroad student isn't technically over since I still have another paper to write, but all my classes are done and I am leaving London in two days.

Last Wednesday I met up with a GW friend studying at LSE to get a final dinner before we said goodbye. We're both seniors and she's staying for another semester, so the next time I see her will literally be at commencement. Before we went out separate ways, we talked about how crazy it is that it's all ending. Both of us could remember in March when we saw each other at Colonial Crossroads and tried to calm one another down about getting into the schools we wanted and getting all our visa and financial stuff in order. Last April wasn't that long ago, but it feels like it.

I've been walking around alone a lot this last week because all of my friends have left for home. So I've been ticking stuff off my London bucket list. And I'm happy to say that I managed to do the things I wanted. Which is a weird feeling because, in reality, I spent a lot of time in bed watching Netflix while I was here. I don't mean that as a joke--I really did spend a lot of time in my room watching movies and reading books. And I felt really guilty about those days. I felt like I was wasting money and opportunities and I was taking all of this for granted. I thought back to reading random blog posts off Google searches that warned me not to spend time on Netflix and to go out all the time and travel and explore and squeeze every ounce of joy I could out of this experience. Now that I'm at the end, I feel like I genuinely didn't do that, but I still had a lot of fun, and I saw so many things, and I feel like I got the most out of this.

...continue reading "If You’re Considering Whether to Study Abroad, Here Are 5 Things To Calm You Down"

By austineliasdejesus

If you’re anything like me, and in many respects I hope you’re not, you’re excited to travel all over Europe during your semester abroad. And, you can. You can travel all over Europe during your time here, but no matter how hard you try to save money, no matter how many friends you split Airbnb’s and meals with and whatever weirdly timed flights you take, those travel costs will rack up. However, if you’re studying in a country like the U.K., you’re lucky to live in a place that has a ton of great cities within it. These cities have their own cultures and atmospheres, so you’re still going to expanding your worldview. We shouldn’t treat nations and their people as monoliths, and traveling to different towns and cities within your home country will help dissemble that limited view. Here are some great trips you can take in the U.K.

1. Bath

You’ve probably heard of Bath. Not to be snarky, but it’s the place with the baths. The Roman baths. It’s a really charming small town and there’s some really nice nature scenery here. And it’s relatively close to London so you can make a day trip out of this and save a good amount of money.

2. Brighton Beach

Brighton will rejuvenate you. The peddled beach is expansive and fun to just hang around at, the pier is beautiful, and there are some great small restaurants and pubs lining the streets. And, the whole trip—if you choose to stay for only a day—will run you about £20.

...continue reading "Save Some Money, Travel Within the U.K. "

By austineliasdejesus

I partly came to London to run away from GW. But, over the course of the past month, I've come to appreciate GW even more. It's less of the school as an institution, but the idea that GW is a place where I feel like I've established myself. I've routinized it and embedded myself within it. It's not always perfect, but if one of those mini college-specific disasters struck--if I messed up a paper's due date or had to seek help from some kind of department--I'd know exactly what to do.

UCL's infrastructure is different, and, as a senior at GW, adjusting to that infrastructure is more difficult if only because I've become more stubborn regarding how I believe things should work at a university. It's an unhealthy and hard-headed way to live as a college student, but it's a lifestyle that I'm going to assume many students who study abroad lead.

Everything came to a head this week, and all my papers for my classes were due. Over the course of the past six months, I stupidly forgot how annoyingly stressful college can actually be. While researching and writing this week, I realized that I hadn't really done anything that I didn't really want to do since I left GW in May. Yes, I had to do work at my internship over the summer and being home brings about its share of responsibilities, but doing the daily college grind of college assessment is a particular kind of labor that brings its own particular kinds of anxieties.

...continue reading "Adjustments"

By austineliasdejesus

When I got here, everyone--from other students to advisors to professors--told me that London is an expensive city. Turns out, they're absolutely right. So far I've lived in D.C. and New York City, and London is by far the most expensive place I've lived. But London does have some great hidden gems, though, you just have to look a little bit harder and be more willing to accept the fact that we're all still college kids, and it's probably not yet our time to go around spending money like we're 30-somethings.

1. 5£ Groundlings tickets at The Globe 

We've all heard about Shakespeare's Globe, so I'm not going to explain it any further. But it is worth mentioning that Globe tickets are actually pretty cheap if you're willing to stand the entire time. These are called groundlings tickets and they're definitely worth it for their cheap price. Yes, you'll be standing for the entire show which is actually pretty long. And, yes, you run the risk of getting rained on and you're not allowed to open your umbrella. But it is still a once in a lifetime experience, and, speaking from experience, you actually feel like you've really experienced the Globe after your feet and back are sore because you've stood in place for 3 hours and you're kind of cold because the heavens opened up and you got rained on for about 20 minutes. That just made this sound very unappealing, but I mean it. Get the groundlings tickets.

2. Go to your school's hangouts

I can't speak for other unis, but UCL has their own pubs and coffee shops. A lot of these are lively and full of other students almost every day and night. Also, beverages tend to be a lot cheaper here, and a lot of them host student performers who are actually pretty good. If you and your friends are looking for a place to go on a Wednesday or Thursday night, try going to one of these places. Also, who knows, you  might even make a new friend or two by hanging around.

...continue reading "5 Fun Things to do in London When You’re on a Budget"

By austineliasdejesus

London was not designed on a grid system. It was not even built as a city based on layers of concentric circles. Rather, it’s a hodgepodge of streets and squares and alleys that somehow makes up a city that 9 million people call home. This means that, if you’re walking, unless you have a good general idea of where you’re going, you will become lost. Larger, more prominent streets veer off into slim side streets, which then veer off into even slimmer side streets, which inexplicably lead to a small park, which contains a small cafe that might have WiFi. And by the time you reach that small cafe in that small park off that slimmest of side streets, you realize that you are way off from where you thought you were, and that you are both exploring and lost in a city that you are totally unfamiliar with but will be your home for three months.

Also, you have been here for a week and have yet to buy a UK SIM card. So, whenever you leave your flat, your phone turns into an iPod, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing because it gives you an excuse to not be on your phone. But it also wrestles the raft that is the “Maps” app from your arms, leaving you to rely on your own sense of direction, which is poor, and then—when that strategy inevitably fails—ask help from strangers, which is just the kind of social interaction that you have spent a good amount of your life avoiding.

Every day of my first week in London, I have become lost. And, every day, I’ve had to swallow the pill dry, and ask a stranger for directions. On Wednesday I ran around Bloomsbury frantically trying to find UCL’s main quad for my enrolment appointment. It took me half an hour to finally admit defeat and ask for directions from a police officer. By the time I found the quad, I was sweaty, late for my appointment, and annoyed by the fact that I had basically been told that I’d been in panicked search of a street I’d been walking directly parallel of for half an hour.

...continue reading "On relearning in the Boston of Europe"