Living in London

It has always been a dream of mine to live in London for a period of time so when the opportunity arose for me to study abroad spring semester of my junior year, I went for it. Studying abroad not only opens your eyes to different parts of the world but also different facets of yourself, as cliché as that may sound. Studying abroad forces you to be uncomfortable, it forces you to adapt, it forces you to be brave and take risks and that’s exactly what I experienced while studying abroad this year.

I studied abroad through CAPA The Global Education Network. I fell in love with the CAPA London program immediately upon finding it on Purdue’s study abroad website. CAPA was one of the only programs available that offered students the chance to intern and study abroad simultaneously.  Something also unique to CAPA was that they had blogs and YouTube videos created by current CAPA students for future CAPA students. So I was able to get the inside scoop into living arrangements, classes, teachers, internship placements and so much more. And that was a big deal for someone like me who wants to know everything they can before committing to something.

The entire program lasted from mid-January until the end of April, so about roughly 3 ½ months. It seemed like a daunting task to stay in a foreign country for an entire semester but luckily, I had some prior experience that helped ease my fears. I studied abroad in Barcelona for a month the summer of 2015 after my freshman year. It was such a surreal experience, mainly because it taught me to be a traveler, which I explained in detail in my article here. Before Barcelona, traveling for me meant staying hotels, taking taxis, eating American fast food and going on the most Americanized tours possible. In Barcelona I actually immersed myself and that was something that I strived to do in London too. I took the tube to work, I shopped at local grocery stores, went to authentic British pubs and eateries and all around just tried to live the way the British do. I even learned how to properly make afternoon tea, which I was especially proud of.

CAPA sent us information about our living arrangements and roommates about two weeks before our flight. I was very nervous about everything because unlike Barcelona, this was the first time I would really be on my own, knowing absolutely no one.  I lived in a flat with 5 other girls. We had two bathrooms, a shared living room and kitchen and two bedrooms where we were separated into threes. My two roommates and I messaged each other on Facebook and introduced ourselves which definitely made me more comfortable about living with strangers. Thankfully, we all got along pretty well and ended up doing different activities around London together during the semester. CAPA owned the entire building we lived in which was nice because we were able to get to know other CAPA students and walk to class together.

Our flat was in Earls Court situated in the borough of Chelsea and Kensington. For perspective, I was about a 20 minute walk from the Natural History Museum and Royal Albert Hall. My location was also ideal for school because I was only a 10 minute walk from the CAPA building and 15 minutes away from the Imperial College, which CAPA is affiliated with. Since CAPA is for American students, we lived and took classes with only Americans. The Imperial College allowed us to join clubs and organizations which gave us the opportunity to meet British students. I didn’t join a club, but I found out that several Imperial College Students went to Hillsong Church and I had been trying to find a good church to go that was nearby and not too old fashioned. Luckily, Hillsong was only a 20 minute tube ride from me, literally across the street from my workplace. I started going every Sunday, plus I joined a small group of students from all over London. I was able to meet people not just from England but also from Malaysia, Canada, India, and different parts of Africa. We would have small group once a week and also socials. I cherish the memories I made with the people of Hillsong London, I’ll always remember the dinners at Franco Manca (probably the best pizza place in London) and laughing until closing time, meeting at pubs in the evening to try different ciders, and going to the movies together the Odeon in Soho. The friends I made at Hillsong also helped ease the inevitable loneliness that moving to a new place brings. Suddenly I had an amazing community to be a part of and they became some of my best friends abroad.

At CAPA I took 4 classes: British film, creative writing, ethics in media and internship class. Each class was 3 ½ hours with the exception of my internship class which was only 1 ½ and I had each class once a week. CAPA was closed on Fridays to give us more time to put in hours at our internships and it also gave us more time to travel on the weekends. The classes were fairly easy, we were given all our assignments on the syllabus and I was lucky enough to only have exams in ethics class and only two exams at that. Every student was also required to attend class each week or risk being sent back to the states. However, that wasn’t a problem for me. The classes were interesting and engaging, they often involved field trips and all of my instructors were really cool and knowledgeable. The instructors were also from all over the world, mine were from America, Ireland and England.

Most people on the CAPA program were matched with a company to intern for. I was matched with Billion Dollar Boy, an influencer marketing agency. I had a Skype interview with one of the employees in December and then in January I was told by CAPA that I was hired and they sent me information about the company. CAPA required us to work 15-20 hours a week depending on how many credits we signed up for. I only had to do 15 hours and I worked on the two days I didn’t have class. I had never worked an actual office job before, and definitely not an actual office job in a foreign country, so to say I was nervous was an understatement. I had no idea what to wear, how to address my superiors, or even when I was even supposed to leave for lunch break, and on top of that I was worried that I might offend them by doing or saying something extremely “American.” The internship class I had to take kind of helped with navigating cultural differences and there actually weren’t as many as I expected. I definitely felt like a fish out of water on the first day (especially because I decided to wear heels and the office was on the FOURTH FLOOR). Each day came with its own challenges but little by little I actually got better at my job. Billion Dollar Boy was a small company, only two years old and there were about 7 of us total. This definitely made it easier to get to know everyone. My coworkers were all pretty young, (the CEO was only 27!) and they were all so fun to be around. We would play music in the office, go out to markets for lunch and sometimes after the day was over, we would all go out for an after work drink. I usually helped search for good influencers to match with different brands. The brand I worked with most of the semester was Garnier which I thought was so cool. The internship taught me a lot about marketing and gave me a lot of good experience to put on my resume.

The weekends provided the opportunity to explore the vibrant city. There was always something happening in London. CAPA gave every student the opportunity to choose two events to do for free and I chose to see a west end production of The Lion King and also the England v. Lithuania world qualifier. They were both amazing and I was so glad I was able to experience those things while I was there. My personal favorite parts of London though were the markets. Borough market always had amazing food for basically anything you had a taste for, whether that be pasta, curry, pizza, pastries, or seafood, they had everything. Notting Hill is not just famous for its colorful homes but also for the Portobello Market. It’s an antique market with beautiful old trinkets and treasures and is one of the busiest markets in London. I bought my sister a gorgeous old compass from the market. My roommates and I also got to visit the Columbia Road flower market, it’s open every Sunday and has rows upon rows of colorful flowers to buy. Camden Market had a very hipster vibe, great food, unique stores and cool restaurants like the Cereal Killer Café a restaurant that exclusively served cereal. Camden was also a popular place for going on pub crawls. Once the sun went down, my friends and I would take advantage of London’s various clubs and pubs. Like most things in London, the clubs were expensive between the cover charges and the drinks. Plus, British DJs were a little behind America when it came to playing the latest hits, but it was still always fun experiencing London’s nightlife. The night tube also made it easy to get home late on the weekends. The pubs definitely had a more relaxed atmosphere. Most were decorated with old fashioned furniture and portraits on the walls. Sometimes people would gather to have a beer and watch a game or listen to live music. But oftentimes pubs were the place to go after work or during lunch breaks.

Another great thing about studying abroad in England is that it’s so close to many other amazing countries. During my semester I was able to go to Morocco, The Netherlands, Scotland, and Ireland. Morocco became one of my favorite trips, because I decided to be brave and sign up to go with a tour group by myself, which is something I never thought I would do in a million years but it turned out to be amazing. Visiting those places so easily and affordably sent my wanderlust into overdrive. I never want to stop seeing new places, there’s always something new to discover and I plan to be a lifelong traveler.

Thinking back on my semester in London, I realize exactly just how much I’d grown. The short three months transformed London from a strange unfamiliar place to an actual home. During my last week in the city, I smiled to myself while doing self-checkout at the grocery store, remembering how the machine angrily beeped at me the first week because I put my food on the wrong side and how it took me forever to pay because I couldn’t yet distinguish between the different coins. I started listening to music and podcasts on the way to work because it made the underground seem less overwhelming. And by the end of the program I could actually tune out the world without missing my tube stops. I learned the proper way to stand when I rode the tube so I wouldn’t stumble. I finally remembered that I lived westbound and could take the Piccadilly, District or Circle line to get back to my flat whenever I strayed too far. I knew that there was a Five Guys 15 minutes away from my flat when I needed a taste of America and I knew which restaurants on my corner stayed open the longest when I was having a late night craving. The Costa coffee shop nearby become my refuge away from my crowded living space and was the best place to do homework because it had unlimited Wi-Fi and great tea.

I learned so much in London, I think being in the city and being on my own taught me more than my classes or my internship ever could. I’m still on a journey of self-discovery, there’s still so much more I need to learn. I’m not still not really sure what I want to do once I graduate, where I want to live or what type of life I want to have. I’m even considering coming back to London now to work for a year after graduation, which would have sounded crazy to me a year ago. I had hoped this experience would make my future a little clearer for me but it has made everything foggier. I feel like I have a lot more options now, and that’s okay. I can only tell the people who ask me about my experience that it was worth it. Studying abroad was worth every lonely tear, every missed tube stop, every screw up at my internship, every Sunday plowing through my assignments last minute after a weekend trip even every extra cent paid to bring that overweight suitcase. Studying abroad is a risk that I recommend everyone taking because you will be changed by the end of it. And you will be amazed by exactly how much.