OOO I haven’t done this in a while. I guess I could start by saying that the entire experience is a little different to what I had made it out to be. It has reached a point where I’m settled, pretty accustomed to Mile End (the area I’m staying at) and have had time to find my bearings. Classes I guess are in full swing and my schedule is now stable, so getting to class and figuring out where and when to go is not too much of an issue. The living situation isn’t great, the accommodation is very average and pretty much bare minimum.
One thing that is so surprising to me is how huge the lectures are. Almost gives me anxiety walking into a lecture hall with hundreds of students, totally out of my comfort zone! I totally took the smaller class sizes at Rollins for granted. During lectures, there is usually little to no interaction with the lecturers. I have seminars for most of my classes, but it definitely did take me a while to get used to it. I do really miss the small interactive classes. I also realized that the system here in regard to setting assessments is totally different. Back in Rollins, I used to barely have free time, there was always homework to be catching up on or an exam to be studying for coupled with hanging out with friends and exploring. However, here I find that I just have a lot of free time. You go to a lecture once a day, and pretty much is free for the rest of the day. It gets lonely sometimes when you don’t really have much to do… I guess that’s one aspect that’s a little daunting, as you feel like you’re abroad and you should always be doing something. But in reality, your kind of just looking for things to do. Also, the weather is SO annoying and SO COLD. Hoping to get to know more people soon so that I have something to do in my free time lol. Other than that, I do love the city, Covent Garden is hands down my favorite place to chill.