COLUMN ONE
College's Counterpoint: Studying Abroad
By Kevin Shea
The moment my foot glided off of the air bus the foreign air overtook the scents
of home, my nose dominated by the smell of Heathrow’s cleanliness and
London’s deep-fried fish and fast food markets, and my ears by the varying
British accents. These small, yet meaningful changes collapsed the imaginary
bridge I built between my American university and experience abroad, and I
realized one thing: studying abroad is the counterpoint of college. My reputation,
grades, accomplishments and all else that breathed familiarity had been left
behind, leaving little more than the fifty pound bag of luggage in my tired hand
and the self-truths I've accumulated throughout my twenty-two year stay on
Earth.
Heathrow Airport quickly asserted its pure power over my being, the paths of
lights on the runways and warning signals from the air traffic control towers
illuminating the ancient, yet homogenously high-tech city; the metallic, modern
architecture of the massive airport served as the overture to the opera of a city
that is London. Our buses speedily moved down the left side of narrow, cobble
stone streets, leaving landmarks like Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey
and St. James’ Park behind in search of our hotel in the quiet South Kensington.
The mixture of old and new, monarchy and democracy and revolution and
peacetime were evident everywhere I looked, proving the wit and will of mankind;
it made me feel extremely small as a mere music industry student from SUNY
Oneonta.
A slew of tour guides boggled my ears with stories of royalty and romance: The
Order of the Garter, the highest order of chivalry in England, was founded by
King Richard I after he helped his daughter-in-law retrieve her garter that had
fallen in the middle of a grandiose royal ball; after doing so, he announced
“shamed be the person who thinks evil of it” to any man unwilling to aid a lady in
distress; I believe we need The Order of the Garter more than ever. My eyes
became boggled by the historic battlefields that surround London; the trees and
grasses of Windsor Castle that witnessed the feudal barons presentation of the
Magna Carta to King John in 1215 are now no more than greens busied with
sheep and cattle grazing.
And when the city walks ended with the sun’s set, the pubs’ dim lights and
inviting names like “The Black Friar” illuminated the faces of my British
contemporaries, accentuating our differences that 1,000 miles of ocean has
created. Their unique fashions, recognizable dialects and diverse intellects from
universities unlike my own humbled me and enlarged the small world that I
thought I had dominated through my successes in college.
In no way was this experience and these emotions negative, though; 4 years at
any university creates a sense of comfort and a false view of how the 'real world'
is. While college nurtures its students and prepares them for whatever path they
choose upon graduation, that same, smaller community that breathed a mutual
love could be the reason you become shell-shocked when you are handed your
diploma and leave the microcosm of college.
Studying abroad is as vital to a student as is taking core major classes; the
humbling, terrifyingly enlightening experience of realizing my size in comparison
to Big Ben, The Tower of London and St. Paul’s Cathedral proved how small my
being is but also how great my potential is; the competitive nature of man is only
so because of each individual’s ability to achieve greatness, and putting on a cap
and gown without first knowing that fact is a disservice to your expensive
education and future. Studying abroad is college's counterpoint: while we study
domestically, we thrive, and while we travel, we are humbled, each experience
balancing the other so as to create a more well-rounded scholar and citizen.