Week after week, I tell myself, “This is going to be the best week yet!” IES has done an amazing job in offering and sponsoring trips to really help us absorb the British culture. I had been to England before, but I never realized how much more I had to learn about England until I started living here. IES organized a trip to Stonehenge, Salisbury, and Bath one weekend, and it was so much fun getting to experience the places many of us have studied while we were all together. We ate the infamous rock cake at Stonehenge, ventured into the markets in Salisbury, and learned about the lives of those in the past in Bath. We had incredible tour guides along the way who were so friendly and that we had a hard time saying goodbye to.
I knew that my Architecture class was going to be fun when I first realized that we would be spending each class in a new area of London, but I didn’t realize just how much of the city we would see. From these experiences alone, I have gotten a much better understanding of where everything in London is and have gotten a better sense of what each borough here is like. It’s an amazing and very educating way to check things I want to do off my list!
My British Youth Culture class is one that I look forward to going to every day and seems to go by in minutes rather than almost three hours. We went on our first field trip to the Soho area and found the places where David Bowie and Elton John were discovered, where fashion geniuses such as John Stephen and Mary Quant set up their businesses, and then to Abbey Road where the Beatles recorded and took the photo for one of their most famous albums. I’ve been to Abbey Road before, but this was my favorite trip yet! Having studied the events that led to this point in the Beatles’ career made it a much more gratifying experience, and my professor is always prepared to make it the most enjoyable time possible.
Some of us have started to fully realize that our time here has to come to an end. Part of me misses home (definitely not the Texas heat!), but a larger part of me never wants to wake up from this dream. I’m already such an Anglophile, and this is only feeding the craze! I’m keeping the end date out of mind and am throwing myself further into the London culture, telling myself that there is no doubt that I’ll be back.
Kimberly Taylor
<p><span style="color: rgb(29, 29, 29); font-family: Arial, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; background-color: rgb(237, 237, 237);">Kimberly Taylor is a junior at Trinity University in San Antonio and is majoring in Psychology and minoring in Art and Art History. In the future, she would like to be a clinical psychologist focusing in the eating disorders field. She comes from Dallas, Texas and is beyond excited to begin her studies and live in London over the summer. On campus, Kimberly can be found working with Alpha Phi Omega, a co-ed community service fraternity, campaigning for human rights with Amnesty International, and promoting political activism with the Trinity Progressives. Otherwise, she enjoys jamming to music, baking, or goofing off with friends. She has been to Costa Rica and Belize for mission trips and has visited Europe before with her family. She is very much looking forward to absorbing the culture of London this summer!</span></p>
