Julie Sievers - Imperial College London, England (Spring 2004)

My Travels

I have always loved to travel so one thing I wanted to do while at Purdue was to study abroad. Fortunately, I was able to take part in a new agreement that was set up with Imperial College in London, England. While there for six months, I was able to take several Materials Engineering classes with English and other international students. Lectures were pretty much like they are here except that the professors pronounced some words slightly different, they didn't start until 9AM, and for the classes I took, I only had lab reports to write for homework.

Extracurricular Activities

I was involved in the Christian Union and a bible study at the college. Since both of these groups met every week I made some good friends who taught me a lot about their culture while learning about mine. I also played basketball on a team with some guys from my hall where I was the only girl. Thankfully, they were open to letting me play, and it was exciting to show them that there are girls that like to play sports.

My Living Experience and the Culture

I lived in a hall that was a five minute walk from campus where I made many new friends of several nationalities. The hall was the only one that served food and it was only dinner served Monday through Friday. As a result, they had kitchens on all the floors where students could cook their own food. My hall also had its own private bar for the students that lived there that we all had to work in so I got to be a bartender a few times during the time I was there.

Sightseeing

Since I was taking fewer classes than the regular students there and didn't have much homework, I was able to go out and explore London's sights along with its back alleys (Colosseum in Rome pictured at right). This picture is of the Colosseum in Rome. I also took some weekend trips to other places in the UK, such as Edinburgh, Cambridge, and Oxford. The big trip I took though was over my Easter Break, where we got a month off between the spring and summer terms to study for the upcoming exams. I traveled for 18 days around Eastern Europe (Germany, Czech Republic, Hungary, Austria, and Italy) with four other people from Purdue that were studying in England. It was exciting to learn about each city through what we saw there and learning everyday tasks, such as food, money, and public transportation, in another language. Needless to say, even though English is becoming the universal language, body language will always be needed.