You always hear students returning from a semester trip to a foreign land saying it. I’m sure I said it after my five month drinking binge in London (that closed out my Junior year). Everyone always says, “Study abroad changed my life.”
It’s a great line. It’s deep, ambiguous, and makes parents feel justified in spending the amount of a small luxury car on your trip. It’s not like I’m saying the trip isn’t worth taking. For some people, it could be the greatest half-year of their life. Whether they spend it tirelessly visiting every city featured in the Rick Steves’ European video set (gift from grandparents) or tucked away in a Dutch opium den with a couple prostitutes who don’t speak English, neither may enjoy their lives more. They will both return home happy people. They’ll speak fondly about their trip and travels. And, as we know, when prodded about their study abroad experience, both will happily proclaim that study abroad, ‘changed their life.’
Although most people mean it, their lives change in more subtle ways than developing a drug habit or becoming a world travel aficionado. Aside from being broke, the most significant change for most people is in their perspective. To steal a line from John Travolta’s Vincent Vega in Pulp Fiction (in reference to his travels in Europe), “They got the same shit over there as we got over here. The differences are in the little things.” While the differences in the way hamburgers were named weren’t mind-blowing, the cavalier attitudes toward American taboos like alcohol and sex were eye opening.
I enjoyed being able to drink beer on the street and see naked women in the newspaper[1]. An interest in English Football (soccer) became a passion. I even developed quite an embarrassing affinity for house and techno music, falling victim to the European club scene. Living in London, like most of the major Western European cities, really didn’t provide too much culture shock. Other than not feeling like a bum if I paid for lunch entirely in change[2], London was about as foreign to me as if I had moved to New York City. Things like relying on public transportation and living in a tiny apartment (flat) with an enormously high rent was different for a kid from the Midwest but weren’t necessarily foreign concepts.
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