Uni vs College

Here in the UK, they frequently refer to college as Uni. As in, "I'm heading back to Uni on Sunday". This contrasts with America where we say "I'm heading back to school on Sunday" or "Man, I love college." They also do not refer to college as school. Ever. You stop going to school once you finish your A Levels at age 18 (don't ask about A Levels, I don't quite understand them either). But regardless, when you pursue higher education it no longer becomes "school" and it instead becomes university, frequently shortened to uni.

As I write this it occurs to me that I made this mistake and it genuinely confused someone. I only just realized this is what caused the confusion. I was speaking with another Brookes students and I was explaining that there were a number of High Point students here with me, and I said "There are actually about 20 other people from our school here." And then she looked confused and asked if I was in secondary school. It's clear now that she was thrown off by my use of the word "school" to describe university.

The name by which they refer to their higher education is not the only different thing about going to college in the UK. Although my only reference is Oxford Brookes University where I am studying, it seems as though this college, as a modern university, is very similar to others in the way they structure classes and schoolwork.

For starters, you generally only go to each module once a week for two or three hours. This can be all lecture, but frequently also includes a seminar set. From what I can tell, the lecture is the entire student population that is taking the module, whereas the seminar contains much fewer people, usually around 20 (which, interestingly enough, is the normal class size at HPU, so that's an intriguing contrast). Because you only spend two or three hours in class every week, you're expected to do a lot of studying outside of class. This is because in the UK Uni is more about independence. We are truly in charge of how much we want to learn; there isn't really any homework, there are less assessments and our tutors (professors) aren't really holding us accountable until the end of the semester.

Also different is the grading system. A 70% is considered a "first class degree" meaning that this is pretty much the best grade you can get. They say that every once in a while, you might get a 75% but that's not really likely. I imagine this will be difficult for me, because as much as they shouldn't matter, I care about grades a lot, probably a little too much (I'm a little too attached to my 4.0). The thought of getting a 70% on an assignment I worked hard on literally pains me. But I have to just remind myself that a. grading is different here and b. I just have to pass, because my grade won't transfer. But I still imagine it will take some getting used to.

Another difference is that you only go to Uni for 3 years. If you earn your Bachelor's degree, it is called a three-year degree. So basically, they earn the same level degree as we do, but they do it in one year less. How? Well it's quite simple. They don't really take any general education credits. I know that High Point is a little excessive in terms of GenEds in comparison to other American universities, but from what I can tell, almost all American universities require some General Education credits: a basic english, science, math etc... Here at Brookes there aren't really any General Ed requirements. You choose your course (major) and you only take modules (classes) that fall within the scope of your course.

You may think that this doesn't have much of an effect upon me, since I am only here for the semester. Well, it definitely does. Let me explain: I am taking one communication class (for my major) and two general education classes (sociology and music history) for the GedEd requirements at HPU. I've just returned from my Listening to Music History module, and I've begun to realize just how much this different system will affect me. Because you only take modules that are a part of your module, every single person (except for my friend Libby from HPU) in the module is majoring in Music. They have taken in depth music classes in high school (I know there was talk about the confusing A Levels in class today) and can name off a number of classical composer including the movements they composed during and when they lived and died. They also know a great deal about music theory and are able to recognize musical techniques, patterns and more just by listening to the music.

Now, I like music, but I can't say I know much about this in depth history the others in the class seem to know. If I were to take this module's equivalent at High Point, I'm sure that a fair number of the other attendees would be taking this course for a GenEd requirement and thus wouldn't have that much background knowledge on the topic. This is obviously not the case here. All of this has left me with one feeling: overwhelmed. As I sat in the class, I felt extremely uncomfortable. I felt like I was already behind and the class hadn't even started yet.

Note: the above was actually written in the hour break between the lecture and seminar portion of my music class. Since then I have actually dropped the music class. I feel as though it wasn't the best use of my time and credits because, although I am by practice a hard worker, it would take a long time to catch up on the years of theory and music history that seems to be needed for this class, time that I don't have. I didn't want to change any of what I wrote, however, because it is a raw reaction to a situation in which I found myself.

I will now be taking the module British Heritage and Culture for credit with our Oxford Brookes Liason Peter (you call your professors by their first names here).  This is actually the first time I have ever dropped a course, but if I had to do it once, this was definitely the time. Just knowing that I won't be in the music class makes the weight on my shoulders lighten. I want to truly enjoy my time here in England and stressing about a class I probably shouldn't have been able to take wasn't the best way for me to do so.

There you have some of the basic differences between going to college in America and uni in the UK. I'm sure more will pop up as I continue to go through classes. I'll update you once I've delved deeper into each of my classes.

The Quest for Gold

...post boxes, I mean.

This past week, we have had time to truly feel like we're living in Oxford, and not just visiting on a whirlwind vacation. We've been hanging out, taking trips into the city centre and just exploring our new temporary home.

Peter, our OBU liason told us that there was a gold post box in Oxford, and our interest was picqued, so on Thursday we decided to search for it.

Let me explain. For the 2012 London Olympics, Royal Mail has painted a postbox gold for every Gold Medal won by a British athlete in the Olympics or Paralympics. A postbox in the Gold Medal Winner's hometown is painted gold, and it just so happens that an Oxford Paralympian won Gold in a rowing event. This is the first time in modern day that post boxes have appeared anything but red, so the gold post boxes are not only iconic but also historic.

We found out what road the gold post box was on and decided to embark on a quest to find it. It wasn't easy to find because it wasn't in the city centre but rather in the neighborhood where Lily van den Broecke's family lives. We did find it eventually, and looked rather touristy as we took pictures with it. But really, we didn't trek all the way there to look at it and leave--we're girls, we had to take pictures.

What was so cool about finding the postbox was this: that even though we weren't in England for the actual Olympics, we were able to experience some of the excitement emanating all over Britain as this year's hosts. This is something that you have to be in England now to experience which was very cool. 

Cheers, Amy. 

Life in Oxford

Friday's trip to Ironbridge was the last of our Heritage visits with all 24 of us, so this week has been about truly living in Oxford--eating, shopping and just existing.

Most of the Study Abroad/Exchange students and the Freshers moved in on Saturday and Sunday, so now there is a lot going on in the Clive Booth Student Village (where I live). It's nice to have people around, because for our first week and a half it was very deserted and didn't feel real.

On Saturday my flatmates and I went to an International Student quiz and supper on campus. We were fed pizza and chips (french fries for those at home) as well as a dessert and it was free, so that's always a plus for any college student. We got into a group of 12 and many different countries were represented--France, Japan, China, Korea, Canada, Spain, Italy and the US, of course. There were four round total--some we did really well on like Flags/Capitals and some that were surprisingly difficult like  the UK Round. We got a few of those questions, but then there were some like "What the the tallest mountains in each of these UK countries: Scotland, Ireland, England and Wales?" And collectively as a team we found we couldn't even name a single mountain in all of Great Britain, let alone the highest." But it didn't seem like many teams got this question, so it wasn't just us. Caitlin, Libby, Austin and I kept waiting for them to ask a questions about Salisbury Cathedral, or Bath or any of the places we went to last week, but they never did. Oh, well. It was fun to meet some other people and participate in a quiz. These trivia challenges seem to be really popular here in Oxford--they do quizzes at pubs nearly every night of the week. We'll have to check one out in the city centre soon.

We've also been swapping numbers with other Oxford Brookes students including a British Australian (with a very interesting accent) here on exchange and a British girl who lives in Clive Booth near our block who teaching us all about British culture. More about British culture soon!

It's a Bridge... Made of Iron

I will admit it, I was not really looking forward to our Friday trip to the Ironbridge Gorge... at all. Every other Heritage trip we have taken has been to an iconic British landmark that I've studied in school or wanted to visit, but not so for our Friday excursion. The Ironbridge Gorge was, quite frankly, a place I, and most of my classmates had never heard of (a fact that shocked our leader Dr Forsaith). Add to all this that the Ironbridge Gorge is over 2 hrs away and the coach left at 8am, and, as you can imagine, I wasn't jumping for joy at the idea of the whole thing.

I am, however, pleased that I was proven wrong on that front. Although definitely not my favorite excursion, Ironbridge was a lot more interesting than I expected it to be. It was a rather pleasant day, if a bit chilly, and we walked up to and across the Ironbridge, which was the first bridge to be successfully made of Iron, thanks to the efforts of the Darby family. It was a beautiful site and a great photo-op, as you can see in this picture of me and my flatmates.

Because the Ironbridge was the first bridge made of iron, it naturally became a spectacle, and as people flocked to the gorge to walk across this bridge (for a fee of course) other ventures sprang up in the area including china, tiles and tar. This area, and this bridge were instrumental in the moving forward of the Industrial Revolution. While in the Ironbridge Gorge/Coalbrookdale area, we saw the Ironbridge Tollhouse, the Museum of the Gorge, the Coalbrookdale Museum of Iron, the Coalport China Museum and the Darby Houses.  As you can imagine, this made for a very long day.

But that's not all folks! Before we left the area, we also had afternoon tea with delicious scones (which Caitlin had been looking for forever, so it certainly made her day) all set up by Dr Forsaith which was extremely generous of him.

By the time we arrived back home in Oxford, we were all exhausted, but I had truly gained a new appreciation for all the Ironbridge Gorge had to offer (and no, I'm not just saying that). While I wouldn't necessarily go back, it was an enjoyable day--it certainly exceeded my expectations.  As always, you can see pictures in the slideshow below:

Don't Drink Bath Water

Wednesday led our group to Bath England to see the Roman Baths, the Bath Abbey and to explore the city of Bath. This time I knew that rain was in the forecast so I was sure to wear my yellow raincoat (also known as my Gordon's Fisherman jacket) and bring my umbrella. We did run into a little bit of rain--not much, but I was glad to have my raincoat.

The first thing we did once we got to Bath was look in the Bath Abbey, which was beautiful. It had a fan vaulted ceiling which was really interesting and different from any of the other chapels that we have seen thus far. There was also a very intricate stained glass window that depicted 56 scenes of Jesus's life (picture in slideshow at end), which was, as you can imagine, a lot to take in.

Next stop was the actual Roman Baths. The museum covers every facet of life when the Roman Baths were in use--it detailed why and when they were built and used, social life of the time, relics from this time period, the explanation of how the Baths work and so much more. What I thought was totally awesome was that the baths are so hot but they aren't heating manually but rather by nature. The baths are filled by a geothermal spring and it take a very long time for the hot water to get from the geothermal spring to the surface so really the water that is currently in the Roman Baths could have been from ages ago, which I think is crazy.

Also included in the museum is an audio tour where you type in a code at any given location to listen to audio from your own personal player. Caitlin, Libby and I found that it was much more interesting to listen to the kids version, which featured characters, sound effects and random facts--much better than the dry adult version that seemed to be a little too much information!

At the end of the museum there is a drinking fountain straight from the spring which means it is very warm and full of all kinds of healthy nutrients. And since healthy rarely equals delicious, the water was pretty, well, disgusting. In my opinion it tasted like copper or blood and it was warm and all together drinking it was not a pleasant experience. But it was cool, I guess. I mean I was in England when it happened, so that makes it awesome in and of it self.

We finished off the day trip exploring the city of Bath and seeing what is referred to as the Georgian Baths--the social culture that emerged when Bath rose back to popularity during the Georgian era. We saw Queen Circus and Royal Crescent which are beautiful houses and we were able to tour a house. My favorite part of this was Royal Crescent because it was actually created to look like the countryside since the elite wanted to live in the countryside because of the views but the city to be near the social center. It was cool to see all this green space in the middle of the city.

Below are some of my favorite pictures from Bath:

It was back to Oxford after that where we made our first real dinner as a flat--burritos. It was fun cooking together and I think this will be a great way to keep the cost down in terms of food this semester.

We have one more Heritage visit to go--Ironbridge on Friday.

Castles and Rocks and Cathedrals (Oh My)

My Monday began at 9am, and from the beginning I knew it was going to be a long day. On the agenda: an intro to our British Heritage and Culture class, Highclere Castle, Stonehenge and Salisbury Cathedral. Monday was our first quintessentially English day that we've had since our arrival. England had a very rainy summer, but presented us with beautiful sunny weather for our first few days in Great Britain, but today we got to experience the rain. I, of course, forgot my raincoat because I was so sure that it wasn't going to rain, so I got quite wet when it poured during our time at Highclere Castle. The rain pretty much stopped after that, but it was overcast and windy at Stonehenge and Salisbury.

Highclere Castle is the home of the Earl and Countess of Carnarvon as well as the main filming location for Downton Abbey. Sunday night we watched the first episode of Downton Abbey (which Austin and I had never seen) so that we could get a feel for the castle and be able to say "That's where Lady Grantham sat!" when we toured the house. They don't allow any cameras in the castle so I don't have pictures to show you, but the inside of the house was beautifully decorated.  In fact, if you'd like to see what it looks like, go ahead and watch Downton Abbey because everything looks the same, minus the family pictures that are removed before filming begins.

Next stop was Stonehenge which is so cool because it is a major mystery as to how (and why) the stones got to their location in Wiltshire, England. They were situated over 2 miles from the nearest settling point and after testing the stones it has been determined that they came from Wales. In 3000 BCE it would have taken a lot  of work and a lot of time to get these massive stones to England. Knowing that Stonehenge has been here for over 5,000 years made seeing the henge and learning about its history so interesting. Unfortunately, this didn't happen (video clip), which was a bummer. Stonehenge would have been much more exciting if the Doctor was there.

Our last stop was Salisbury Cathedral, which I was extremely excited to visit since we learned about it in AP Art History with Mrs. Thorne. It really did live up to expectation. The architecture is amazing and the stained glass was beautiful. We took a tour of the cathedral and we were able to learn all about the history of the cathedral and why it was built in Salisbury. Also located in the Salisbury Cathedral is the Magna Carta--one of the most important documents in the establishment of democracy so we got to see that as well. The last thing we did at Salisbury Cathedral was attend Evensong which was a beautiful service. A number of the choristers were children, and it was amazing how well they sang--you would've thought that they were professionally trained. The choir sang the Psalms, some of the prayers and an anthem and a lectern read two lessons. The Church of England is similar to the Episcopal denomination so a lot of the prayers were similar. The last thing on the agenda was dinner at Sarum College in their tiny refectory. It was a delicious meal--I have to admit I wasn't expecting much but Sarum proved me wrong.

We got back to Clive Booth Hall around 9pm totally exhausted but it was totally worth it. A jam packed day full of picture opportunities so naturally I left my memory card in my computer. The pictures in the slide show below were taken by Libby, Caitlin or Austin.

Oxford, You're Taking My Breath Away

Sunday we had a free day to explore Oxford and really do whatever we wanted. Although we were all exhausted from being constantly being on the move and walking a lot as we explored Oxford and London, Sunday was the last day of Heritage Open Days when a number of British landmarks and cultural institutions are open to the public for exploration. That means that a lot of the Oxford University colleges were open for free, which we had to take advantage of. So, we set off on Sunday to explore Oxford and visit a number of the Oxford Open Door locations.

We started the day at Carfax Tower, which was a great way to see all of Oxford. 74 feet tall, we had to climb 99 steps to get to the top, which, as you can imagine, gave us an awesome view of Oxford. From one side we could see High Street and the rest of the city of Oxford, and from another side we could see into the country side. It was all breathtakingly beautiful. I've put some of my favorite pictures from Carfax tower in the following slideshow:

After Carfax Tower we went to the Old County Courthouse where we were able to sit in the chamber where all of Oxforshire's cases were tried as well as the chamber where the current Oxford City Council meets. We were also able to go in the tunnel under the courthouse that lead to the jail. We then moved on to the colleges of Oxford University. In case you weren't aware, there are 38 constituent colleges within Oxford University. So when you study at University, you must also be enrolled at one of these colleges such as All Souls College, Queen's College and Magdalen College, which are the colleges that we visited. 

When we arrived at All Souls College, a post graduate institution, there was a band playing, which made it a lively environment. There were a lot of people around, laying on the grass in the courtyard and taking photos. All Souls also has an amazing chapel with a beautiful arch and breathtaking artistry. Literally the first thing that I said when I walked in was "Oh wow." For a moment or two there weren't any words to describe it.  

We then went to Queen's College which was a much more sober affair, but beautiful in its own right, especially the ceiling of the Queen's College chapel. My favorite university that we visited, however, was Magdalen College (pronounced 'maudlin'--pronouncing it like Magdalene is a rookie mistake that we thankfully did not make). When we walked into the courtyard, the college looked like something out of a fairy tale, and there is a massive park/garden behind the buildings that was so serene and peaceful. Some of my favorite shots of the colleges can be seen below. As always, just click on the picture to see a larger version.

Every inch of Oxford seems to be covered in history, and as I walk down the street each day, I am amazed that I get to study here for the next few months. I'm blessed to have been able to take advantage of this opportunity and I intend to soak it all up while I am here.

God Save the Queen

On Saturday, we went into London for the first time! London is such an interesting city because it's most people first compare it to New York, but it gave me a much more DC feel because of the architecture, sites and green space.

Victoria Memorial

This trip, lead by Dr. Forsaith, was designed to give us a taste of London, so we walked around a lot and saw many of the sites from the outside. First on the list was changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. I was a bit too short to see what was going on, but Caitlin and Libby let me know what was happening. I also got a bit distracted by the sniper on the roof... During the changing of the guard, the military guard starting playing Dancing Queen and Mamma Mia by ABBA, which was surprising and actually quite funny. Libby and I of course had to sing along.

We then walked through a park by Buckingham Palace to get to Westminster Abbey which was beautiful, and then we got to see Big Ben (which, fun fact, is now called Queen Elizabeth Tower because of the Diamond Jubilee). We ate lunch at a place called Wesley Cafe and then walked around a little more past Downing Street, the houses of Parliament and the Household Cavalry museum and then got back on the bus. We drove around London on the bus for a while and drove past Baker Street (where the famous 221b Baker Street is), Tower of London, Tower Bridge (with the Paralympic logo hanging off it) and other beautiful buildings.

I had a great time in London and can't wait to explore further soon. I have included some photo highlights in a slideshow below (clicking on the pictures allows you to view them larger):

First Impressions

7AM, just off the plane.

Leading up to my flight to England, I experienced a wide range of thoughts and emotions. Sometimes I thought I wouldn't have enough room for all of my things, sometimes I thought I'd have more than enough room. Sometimes I felt overwhelmed, sometimes I felt remarkably calm. And I flip flopped between being anxious and not nervous at all. So I didn't know how I would feel the day of my flight: I could be cool a cucumber or a basket case. As I've said, this is my first time travelling out of the country, so this is all new to me.

Regardless of my various emotions, I was ready to leave; it was time. I felt like I was in a strange limbo. I had finished work the week before and my friends from home were all back at their own universities  All of my HPU friends were back at High Point and it was strange seeing all of their posts and pictures. Even though I knew I was going to have an amazing time in England, I was kind of jealous seeing all the fun they were having together, and being stuck at home just waiting to leave was tough. But finally it came time to leave and then it all started moving so fast.

I planned to spend the evening before my flight at home having a nice dinner with my family. I wanted to have the evening to make sure I had all of my ducks in a row. This didn't happen, however. My family got last minute tickets to a Washington Nationals game for free and we couldn't say no (well, we could have, but why would we?). Although it may have complicated things because I lost an evening of packing and preparation time, I could not have imagined a better way to spend my last night in America than in the Nation's Capital watching America's pastime--baseball. Watching the Nats is one of the things I really miss abut being home so I'm really glad that I got to go to one more game before I left.

My goodbyes began the night before when I had to say goodbye to my dad as he would be at work the next day. It felt strange saying goodbye to someone knowing I'd be in a foreign country thousands of miles away. However, my parents are visiting in October, so it is not goodbye for long. The rest of my goodbyes came the next day. At the airport, I think our parents had a much harder time saying goodbye than Libby and I did. We kept trying to head to security so we could, you know, get to our flight on time, and every few steps they would stop us and say something else. I've always thought goodbyes were kind of awkward and it turns out goodbyes before a four month trip to England are no exception. It's just, you hug goodbye and then what? Just turn around and walk away? Like I said, awkward.

But anyway, my airport and flight experience wasn't too stressful because Libby, Caitlin, Austin and I all flew out of Dulles together direct to Heathrow. And apparently people's first impression of me is that I'm a young, weak girl, so people were easy on me. I am pretty tiny and I guess I have young looking face, but I hope I don't look incapable or helpless. That was the vibe I was getting from the people I encountered.

The first encounter of this nature was at the British Airways check in counter. Everyone (including Libby, Caitlin and Austy) who was checking baggage was given a tag for their bag and then instructed to take them to the TSA bag drop. Me? Nope, no need to take them, apparently. The man just took them behind the counter and wished me a pleasant flight. Did he think I wasn't strong enough to carry my own bags?

Second encounter: at customs on the way into England each of us went though individually. The customs officer asked me why I was in England and when I told her I was as student she asked me where, I answered and then she smiled and said "Welcome to England." And I was done. I remember thinking about how remarkably easy it was.

Later, I learned that collectively the others were asked for proof of acceptance to a UK university, lectured about whether they planned to work and that they can't work without a visa and one was even questioned about how she planned to pay for things, what the credit limit on her credit card was and other questions about her finances. I have not clue why I didn't get asked anything more than where I was studying and why I didn't have to provide any sort of proof. Is it because I look harmless or helpless? I'm not really sure. And maybe it was nothing, but it was, I will admit, a little disconcerting. I think of myself as an intelligent and prepared individual so I hope that my sometimes silly and happy personality doesn't give others a first impression that is quite different from how I actually am.

Now that I think about it, both of these people were British, so could this have been a combination of what they first read into me by looking at me as well as preconceived notions of young Americans? I'm not entirely sure but it gave me a lot to think about.

I also noticed a few things when we landed in London that affected my first impression of England. Firstly, there were a lot of people in the terminal when we deplaned (many from our flight I'm sure because our plane was massive--two floors and by far the largest plane I've ever been on). As we were trying to go down a floor to take the shuttle train to Customs, everyone was shoving and barely anyone gave the cursory "sorry" or "excuse me" that you hear in America. From the get go, my first impression was not especially favorable, although it was 6AM and most had just gotten off a super long flight, so I can't rightly blame them.

It didn't get better though--a number of airport employees seemed quite impatient and the coach driver from Heathrow to Oxford was pretty rude. We approached him with our bags which he was putting under the coach, and after he took them he just stared at us. Blankly. After a moment or so he barked "Well?" Well what? After another beat, he impatiently asked "Where are you going?" Really, couldn't he have just asked that in the first place? We didn't know we were supposed to tell him at that given moment and I don't think we were being ignorant or slow in not realizing this.

So that was my initial first impression of the English, but I realize that judging a city or country based on the actions of people in an airport in the early morning is unfair so I haven't really held on to these impressions. Especially since when our coach pulled into the Oxford Brookes busstop, Dr Schweitzer and Peter, our OBU faculty liaison, were there waiting to greet us and lead us to our flat. Peter even rented a van to drive our suitcases (and us) so we didn't have to drag them down a crazy hill. This successfully cancelled out my less than pleasant encounter with the coach driver.

Our first day was probably the longest day of my life. Considering I was up for over 30 hrs straight in order to beat jet lag (I didn't get any sleep on the plane, not surprisingly) this isn't even an exaggeration  Although I was super tired, I remember being blown away by Oxford the first time we went into the city center. We just don't have cities like this in the United States. A number of these buildings were built before Columbus even discovered American, and many before the US even became a country. I was just struck by the beauty of the buildings. I'll write all about about Oxford in a later post.

So there you have it, my first impressions the first time I've travelling abroad. How accurate are they? Only time will tell--I'll let you know.

Cheers, Amy.

Settling into Our British Home

Wow! September 7th felt like the longest day of my life! Because our flight left Dulles at 6pm, we got into Heathrow at 1am EST, which is actually 6am BST so just as it felt like our day was ending, it actually began again.  I wasn't able to sleep on the plane at all, so I was exhausted and powered through the day until we were finally able to go to bed that evening. Being awake for 30+ hours can really take a toll on your body and I think we're all still trying to catch up! But I think I've successfully adjusted to British time, so staying up that long served its purpose.

I live in a flat with (right now) 3 other people: Libby, Austin and Caitlin, all friends from HPU. There are five rooms in our flat, but right now no one lives in Flat D. I live in Flat E, which used to be the living room, so my room is actually three times (possibly more) the size of everyone else's room, which only have just enough room for the bed, armoir and desk. Pictures of my room are below:

We also have a kitchen, toilet room and bathroom (for showering) that we all share as a group. Dr Forsaith, our Oxford Brookes liason was kind enough to buy us dishes, silverware and some pots and pans to get us started, which was super nice of him. 

On our first day here, we ate at Turf's Tavern, a famous pub here in Oxford. In order to get there, you have to walk down a (slightly creepy) passage, which means that the only people who go there are people who know where to look for it. Because of this it isn't much of a tourist location. There is a sign pointing the way, which Libby is pictured with the right.  After dinner we walked the city centre to get the lay of the land.

On Friday, Dr Forsaith took us on a more in depth tour of the city centre. We saw the outside of a lot of famous Oxford sighs such as Christ Church, the Bodleian Library, High Street, Broad Street and the Covered Market. Some of my favorite pictures are below!

We also enrolled on Friday, so I'm officially an Oxford Brookes student. I'm so excited for this adventure! I hope you enjoyed reading about my first few days here, and don't forget you can enter your email address to get notifications when I post something new (on the right). 

The First (And Most Important) Decision

Hello readers, my name is Amy and I am currently on the biggest adventure I've ever embarked upon. For the next three months I will be studying abroad in Oxford, England and traveling to nearby destinations for the first time. But before I can tell you about now, I need to cover the how. And for that, I have to start at the beginning.

When I was a child, I really wanted to travel. I wanted to visit different states, fly to different coasts and see different things.

When I was a preteen, I wanted everyone to know that I wanted to travel. When people asked, I almost always included travel in my list of favorite things (even though I hadn't really done much travel at all, other than a few family vacations).

When I was a teenager, I wanted to travel internationally. I wasn't able to go on a school trip to Italy a few of my classmates when on, so going to Italy became my new goal.  I wanted to see Italy and I wanted to see the world.

When I was looking at colleges, I wanted to study abroad. I wanted to pick a school with great study abroad opportunities. At every college visit I would inquire about locations and look at pamphlets and brochures of college students having the time of their lives living in a foreign country, and that's what I wanted.

When I started college, I had a hard time adjusting to being in a new place, at a new school with new people, and my plans began to change. I decided that, as much as I had always wanted to travel, maybe being away from home, being in an entirely different country, for so long wasn't the right path for me. I let myself rule out study abroad out of fear.

Spring of my Freshman year, I had the head of High Point's Faculty in Residence Program as a professor, and as he talked about his plans for a Prague Faculty in Resident program I was jealous of those who would be able to join in on this amazing adventure, but I resigned myself to the fact that this particularly type of adventure was not right for me and I put it out of my mind.

But then, the following Fall, I received an email about an Oxford Faculty in Residence Program, and I allowed myself to think about study abroad once more. I have always been a bit of an anglophile. As a child I loved Harry Potter and speaking in British accents and as I have grown up I have enjoyed British television, musicians and culture in general. The idea of being in England for four months was too tempting to resist investigating further. My search turned up more and more reasons for me to throw caution to the wind (please excuse the cliche) and allow myself to do the thing I wanted so badly to do all my life: travel internationally while studying abroad.

A number of things made me feel more and more sure of my decision to study abroad in Oxford: the HPU professor traveling with us, the ease of getting credits transfered due to the relationship between Brookes and HPU and the people with whom I'm able to share this adventure. Although it was not planned this way (I assured them as well as my family that I would still want to go even if they weren't going), my best friend from high school, my sophomore year roommate and a close friend from High Point are on this trip as well.

I can still remember when I told my parents that I was once again considering study abroad. I said it so nonchalantly and I think it threw my mom for a loop. I had not really spoken about it since I had decided that I wouldn't pursue it, and all of a sudden I was home telling them I wanted to put down my deposit when we got back to school. It was all very quick, but I think that was better for me. It didn't give me as much time to worry and talk myself out of it before I became financially committed.

And truly, I know that I made the right decision. I had grown and changed a lot in my first year of college, and although my rough first year caused me to initially rule out study abroad, I came to realize that it better prepared me for this semester away from home. I'm stronger, more independent and more positive--I know that frustrations are temporary and that sometimes it takes a little time (and the right mindset) to settle into a new place. I think I needed an opportunity like this to prove to myself that I have matured since I was a freshman in college and that I can conquer my fears.

Henry David Thoreau said "Not until we are lost do we begin to find ourselves." This is true of my long and drawn out journey to the decision to study abroad that brought me to where I am today: Oxford, England ready to have the time of my life. I may have gotten a little lost along the way, but because of that I feel stronger in my convictions and my decisions and I know I have great semester ahead of me.

So there you have it. The how that leads to now. (I swear I did not intend for that rhyme to occur. It just happened, I promise.) Although you've already heard more about myself and my story then you probably wanted to, I'll explain a little bit about what I want to get out of this semester. As you may have been able to surmise, I've never been to Europe before now. This is my first time travelling internationally other than Mexico (which I don't think really counts because it's on the same continent as America) so I'm excited to get a taste of Europe.

I know I can't see everything (really, you couldn't even see everything in one lifetime) I want to get a feel for what places I like, what places I didn't, and places I may want to explore further in the future. I like to think of it as an appetizer sampler at a restaurant. You don't get very much of any one food, but you learn what you want to order next time.

I have big plans for this semester, and you'll have to follow along to figure out just what they are.

Cheers! Amy