Skip to main content

Final Reflection - Arwa

The opportunity of traveling to London along with my classmates and teachers for 10 days was a greatly significant experience for me. Even through such a short time, it helped me widen my knowledge of the city, and develop my identity and independence as an individual.
Through our journey throughout London, I grew to understand the deeper meaning and connection throughout all of the landmarks, buildings, etc. that we visited every single day until we left. One of the most important parts and benefits of this trip was education, and the knowledge gained, but what I think was also equally as important was that spending 10 days consecutively with the same exact people, helped getting you closer to some of your classmates that you might've never even talked to before at school, but by going on this trip you were able to talk to them and find out things about them that you never even knew before, and you were able to get this type of chance by going on this trip.
For these reasons, this A-Term provided me with a greater and larger sense of community and connection with my classmates, but as equally, a greater sense of the large and vast history behind many of the landmarks we visited that were in and around the London area.

During our 10 day trip, we toured over 30 landmarks, including cathedrals, museums, castles, royal palaces, royal residences, and more. Throughout our tours of each location, we were each able to reflect and contemplate our own personal reactions to every location, but as equally, we were able to react in those same different ways, but as a group. Being able hear each others different perspectives helped to make you think harder about some aspects that had maybe never even popped into your mind before.
This trip had also helped me create connections with my classmates and through those connections, I was able to slowly and morecomfortably come out of my shell, which was a major accomplishment for me. I was also able to further develop and practice my independence because this trip created great stepping stones and opportunities for me to also pick up some new skills in the process of cooking, cleaning, etc. throughout each day. As this trip was a bonding and developmental experience for all of us, there was also equally, a very prominent educational aspect to it.

As we visited over 30 landmarks throughout out short 10 days in London, we were able to see the very long and prominent history that exists within, throughout, and outside the city in general. What stood out to me the most was how we were able to witness the full of circle of how the royal family had conquered, oppressed, and then ultimately, got to the somewhat powerless point that they are at now. We first saw one of the four original copies of the Magna Carta, which was the first ever document to show the peoples response and rise to the oppression of the King, Queens, and monarchs. Later that week, we were again able to see the peoples response to oppression caused by the government through the large Brexit march that we were able to witness first hand.
Throughout all of these experiences, I was able to fully immerse myself into the history and culture of the city in a way that widened my knowledge that was able to help me realize what my interpretation of London would be.

Overall, I could easily say that throughout this trip I was able to widen my knowledge so that I was able to reflect and realize what my interpretation of London was, but as equally, it was a connective experience for all of us to develop and foster bonds and connections between each other as a group. It was also a way to further our own independence as individuals through the stepping stones and opportunities that were given to us. Lastly, I could easily say that this trip was one of the highlights of my year so far and I felt truly lucky to able to go and visit London in such an amazing and magical way with this group of classmates and teachers. I hope that our trip to London together impacted everybody else in the same amazing way that it has impacted me.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Day 3 :: Written Blog - 7.5 miles (on foot)

Our day started off by paying a visit to the royal family's palaces. We walked by Buckingham Palace. Before we got there we learned a little bit about it, the most useful fact for the visit was about the flags. There are two flags flying at Buckingham Palace, the Union Jack and the Royal Family's flag. When the Union Jack flies above the palace that means that the queen is not in the building. If the Royal Family's flag is flying then she is in Buckingham Palace. Luckily the queen was in. We did not get to see her but we all talked about where she might be in this huge building. The gates are crowded with people and armed soldiers guarding the gates. (We suspect she chooses to stay in the back rooms.) During our visit to Buckingham Palace we also visited the Queen's Gallery. There were two available exhibits, one focusing on the Russian Royalty and the other focusing on The Shadow of War. The Russian Royalty exhibit had many beautiful paintings, artifacts, and sculp...

Day 2 :: Written Blog - Exhausted but Excited

After spending roughly six hours at school, a couple of hours at the airport, eight hours on the flight and twelve hours in the city itself, I am finally bringing to you the first blog installment in which we are located in our target destination: London, England. Today's London adventures weren't really adventures in the traditional sense. Rather, they generally comprised of grocery shopping at UK chain Sainsbury's and settling-in to our apartment living situation. We did spend around an hour at Shakespeare's Globe Theater; seeing it recreated after 420 years so faithfully with the stereotypical cloudy English sky truly blasted me to the past, and all of the anecdotes and stories of the rowdy and raucous crowd heavily contrasts with the polite and kind people we have encountered so far. We additionally spent an hour at the Tate Modern museum of art, which showcases works not only from the UK, but around the world, with such famous names as Picasso, Matisse, Mondrian,...

Day 1 :: Photo & Written Blog - We Arrived!

Hello friends and family! ~36 hours ago the “ Exploring Historical, Political, and Geographic Landmarks in London, England A-Term” embarked on a voyage to immerse, and educate, ourselves in a community other than our own. Through this experience, we have a multitude of events planned, but in order to achieve these, we must first arrive in the amazing city of London! Our plane ride to London was 8 hours long, and because we were traveling in the opposite direction of time (east), we lost a significant amount of time, and sleep. This contributed to an immense amount of jet-lag that we felt through our morning after arriving at the London Heathrow airport. In the end, we were able to regroup, pick up all our luggage, and arrive at our hotel. Although a lot of us lost track of time, and we are all currently very tired, we are all looking forward to our trip! That being said, I and our group, are thoroughly missing our friend Asa, who was unable to make on the trip due to a last mi...