When I left for London in 1977 for my junior year abroad, I was weighed down with enough paraphernalia to guarantee a safe trip. I had two rosaries, one rabbit’s foot, several notes of support, a lucky necklace, and a hardcover copy of Gravity’s Rainbow.
More experienced students carried only sleeping bags, backpacks, and paperbacks.
We choose our own baggage, I have since learned, but I wasn’t aware of that in 1977. I took everything with me because I had no idea what to expect.
Along with the amulets, I carried the piece of paper from the Study Abroad office to reassure myself that this was all perfectly normal, but there were elements I found less than reassuring in this document. One of the items, for example, indicated that I might want a “rucksack.”
I figured that I wouldn’t need this mysterious item because I didn’t have a ruck.
As a scholarship student, I traveled on the cheap and lived on the cheap. I took public transport, schlepped my too-stuffed suitcases, and wept when I saw the concrete building where I’d be spending the next several months. My section of London looked about as quaint as Flatbush. It was about eighty degrees (although they used that weird centigrade business) and all I had with me were heavy sweaters and flannel skirts.
The first few days, I was miserable. I’d sit in my room on Gower Street and listen to people talking and laughing from the street below. It struck me as unbelievably odd that for everybody else it was simply an ordinary week. I wanted to phone home, but I couldn’t afford it; I wanted to leave but I’d taken out all those extra loans. There was nothing to do except to stay.
Since I couldn’t just sit in my room all day, I decided to do the only thing I could afford to do: I went for walks.
I walked to the law courts and admired the buildings. I walked to Kew Gardens. I walked down the Strand and went into bookstores, walked through the Regent’s Park Zoo. Finally, when I was thoroughly exhausted at night and could sleep without wondering every 15 minutes what time it was “at home,” I started wondering what I was eating while I was eating Toad-in-the-Hole. I regained my sense of curiosity. I smiled. And even the staid Brits smiled back.
During those first days I groped around as if I were exploring a dark cave, not realizing that I carried a light with me—even though I had packed poorly.
One fine day I walked to the British Museum. I felt safe in museums and immediately started searching for a place where I could buy a cup of coffee (always my first stop). I happened to pass a manuscript of The Canterbury Tales.
This wasn’t like anything I’d ever seen at home. This was Something Else, with a history longer than anything I could imagine. People had looked at this manuscript before it became required reading. These luscious pages weren’t hidden away in some small room for the exclusive and fetishistic gaze of serious scholars but were instead right there on the ground floor. Suddenly it felt as if there were enough of everything to go around.
I knew then, with smiling relief, that I wouldn’t have to be too scared to be across the Atlantic anymore. I’d found a place of safety. If this manuscript could be safe here, then so could I.
Within a month I’d seen 12 plays, made good friends, and fallen in love. But those first few days had as much learning as anything that followed, even if it wasn’t part of the curriculum, even if what was necessary—a little courage, a little imagination, a little belief in the possibility of unforeseeable happiness—hadn’t been listed as a suggested resource.
I left London with less baggage than I’d come with, and what I left behind was at least as important as what I took with me. I’ve heard the same stories from nearly every one who has studied abroad.
You learn that you carry the ability to make a life for yourself wherever you are.
It is a lesson that should never be underestimated; it is one of the few lessons on which we are all tested again and again.
Photo: Flickr user contraption
63 Responses to Why Every Student Should Study Abroad
partly_cloudy - November 30, 2010 at 7:37 am
You may not have been able to afford to do anything once you were there, but many students cannot afford to travel at all. I know I couldn’t have. I wasn’t able to travel (and even then, only in the United States) until I got a job that paid for it.
deanette - November 30, 2010 at 7:57 am
At my institution, there are additional monies available for students who want to study abroad but very few of them know about it, which is ridiculous. The Study Abroad administrators don’t do a very good job, in my opinion, of soliciting the interest of students who could benefit most from travel (ie, the ones like p_c above), meaning the ones who would not be able to do it on their own. I wonder if that is because they don’t want poorer kids stuck someplace without resources, but I don’t know. Anybody have insight into this? Is there discrimination, active or passive, against working class students?
stevenweinberg - November 30, 2010 at 10:08 am
Completely agree. My girlfriend and I are coming out with a book in March that simply could not of happened without us both studying abroad. After meeting in Morocco of our junior year, we lived in China and West Africa after graduation teaching English, living on a research fellowship, and making art. You can see all about our book, To Timbuktu here- http://allthewaytotimbuktu.com/
11336803 - November 30, 2010 at 11:33 am
Deanette: Getting working class and other under-represented students to study abroad is something most study abroad offices work very hard on. They are rewarded for sending more students abroad, discouraging students from going would not be good for their professional health. Working class students (which are the majority at my institution) tend not to see study abroad as being “for them.” They believe it is too expensive (see the first comment above) even though there are programs that cost the same or less than attending the home institution. There are also dedicated funding sources for Pell Grant recipients such as the Gilman scholarships. But because they start out with the assumption that it is too expensive, they don’t pursue it. Finally, the boozey reputation of some students and programs sometimes cause it to be taken less seriously. This ignores the thousands of students who work very hard learning and exploring.
wendywilliamson - November 30, 2010 at 11:38 am
Nicely done! Very well put.
rasdigital - November 30, 2010 at 12:09 pm
I was born and raised in London and migrated to the US for high school. In 1989, it was my junior year of university and I returned to the UK as an “exchange student” to finish my degree with a group of American’s who, similar to the author, had no idea what to expect from going to England. I befriended several of those students and became their imprompto tour guide around Londontown and the rest of the country and the continent. For many of these student, it was their first time away from home, their first time travelling outside of the US, but what made their experience so worthwhile is that my family migrated to the UK as the 3rd wave of Caribbean immigrants in the late 50′s; these students were able to see a multicultural London that they did not know existed. They went to areas of town that do not exist on tourist maps and in “Let’s go” books and they were highly appreciative of the bizzare West Indian foods that they tried, the highly heated 5-a-side football and basketball games outside of council flats that we played in. Just like the author, these expereinces allow these students to have the confidence to travel the world and to see tourist trap areas, but it also gave them a sense of appreciation to go “off the beaten path” and interact with individuals who did not look like them and that normally back in the US, they would never interact with in any arena.
When I taught college students, I always lauded the benefits of Student Exchange and travelling as a college student, the people you meet and interact with that come from all walks of life and from all parts of the world can become the best education you will recieve in your life. Regardless of class or status, humanity will always prevail when you approach a new environment with an open mind, an ability to live outside of your comfort zone and a hungry belly.
afs961 - November 30, 2010 at 10:19 pm
Brilliant article!
As a former Counselor for a program that focused on retention of first-generation/low income university students, we prided ourselves on sending almost all of our students abroad — or at least to intern in Washington DC with our system-wide research program (UC/DC).
These were students who came from challenging neighborhoods, very low income backgrounds, and/or with stories that would break your heart — yet, they pursued higher education. I told them an educated person understands the world around them, and studying abroad was the best way to learn that — so off they went with some going to more then one country. Fees were the same whether they stayed and went nowhere, or studied in Cambridge, Seoul or Madrid.
I come from the same background as my students and lived abroad for the heck of it before I started college. I am now months from getting my PhD and credit seeing the world I eventually studied as some of the best education I could have gotten.
dank48 - December 1, 2010 at 2:59 pm
If I hadn’t studied abroad, I would never have believed that some people put mayonnaise on French fries.
bcbailey64 - December 1, 2010 at 3:37 pm
I totally agree as I have had similar experiences. I actually went to England in 1976 for junior high and it changed my life. Later, I went to Japan in 1991 to teach ESL. I had no previous teaching experience, didn’t know anyone in Japan, couldn’t speak Japanese and didn’t like sushi. I stayed 6 years and loved it. I met my wife, learned how to teach, had a child, made many, many of the greatest friends imaginable and got into all sorts of hilarious, never to be duplicated situations. The most important thing I learned was exactly the same, that you can live anywhere and you have ALWAYS have the necessary tools to succeed. Don’t listen to that little voice that says you can’t. YOU CAN. Unfortunately, you can’t learn that at school, you have to live it.
swish - December 1, 2010 at 4:06 pm
It’s a fine article, but I take issue with the title. *Every* student? Just because many — or most — students have positive, enriching experiences abroad, I question whether *anything* in life is, without qualification, good for *everyone.*
bazan - December 1, 2010 at 4:14 pm
What an exotic adventure ! You did not even had to speak a foreign language !
11171735 - December 1, 2010 at 10:11 pm
You walked to Kew Gardens from Gower Street?! You didn’t take the Picadilly Line from Russell Square, change to the District Line towards Richmond, exit the Kew Gardens Station and then walk around Kew Gardens? Even though I think that particular trek is a bit long, walking is the best way to get to know London between South Kensington and Chancery Land and between Hampstead and the Strand, and walking is the gentlest way to ease into a new place.
tosyne - December 3, 2010 at 4:27 am
after going through all these comments,the urge to study abroad increases but the problem is how to go about it especially when i cant raise the fund,is there anything i an do?
joesuber - December 3, 2010 at 3:50 pm
At VSU, we offer both the Study Abroad and National Student Exchange programs. Unfortunately. during my college years, the idea of studying abroad never entered my mind. Fortunately, my military stint allowed me to visit many parts of the world which were an education unto itself. Now, I am a strong advocate for exchange programs. As the world shrinks, our cultural experiences MUST continue to grow. Stimulating article!