My Trip to London, Spring 2019!

This trip has been an amazing experience!!! It's also been a very difficult one! Haha.  Wow.  I can't believe that it's already drawing to a close... As I get ready to say goodbye to the place that I called home for 7 weeks, I'd like to focus on all the good travelling abroad has done for me.  Ready? Let's dive in! (Aliah and I at the temple in Southall) First good thing: exposure to all kinds of culture.  From our trip to Southall to being in ethnically diverse wards, I got to get in touch with different religions, food, and some really cool individuals.  Southall is home to many people whose families immigrated from countries like India and Pakistan.  We went to a Sikh Temple, and it was amazing to see the similarities between my own beliefs and theirs! We had to wear the appropriate head covering and then we were taught about their beliefs.  Sikhs are vegetarian because they believe that harming animals in this world brings you bad karma in you...

You know, it’s funny, because even though I knew we were taking a trip to the Lake District in northern England, I was still surprised when confronted with an actual lake.   I guess I was expecting something sort of muddy, swampy, perhaps a bit underwhelming… but no.   Windermere lake was looking like a dime when we drove past.   The sun was out (a pretty rare sight overall on this trip), the lake sparkled.   Boats sailed past lazily with white sails.   The town of Ambleside is super cute and just feels cozy.   It was pretty great, and my new life goal is to retire there someday.                 A view from outside our hostel in Ambleside  (Sketch from a hike)   We did so many great things on this particular trip!   Our first stop was the home of the Brontes.   Turns out, their story is pretty tragic- all 6 kids died before reaching middle age, som...

This week, I got to spend three days in the lovely, crowded, historical city of...  (as you might have guessed from the title)  ... ROME! My professor, Dr. Kramer, challenged us to be more than just tourists on this trip.  Instead of being simply consumers of a packaged trip, I was to look for the little, spontaneous things that I experienced.  To be honest, I didn't do too good a job of consciously pulling this feat off.  My mind was swept away by the Colosseum, awe-inspiring Vatican Basilica, and Trevi Fountain.  After I got back to London and looked through my camera roll however, I realized that I had been paying attention to the little things.  These little things being in the form of... foliage.  More specifically, how the flowers and vines covered so many of the restaurants and homes in Rome.  As someone who grew up in the desert where I was lucky to find a couple trees in a mile radius, I've always been easily swept up by b...