New Londoner

June 22, 2016

Of all of the places in the world, the city of London is most similar to the city of Boston, so there was very little culture shock experienced. It took only one month for me to think of myself as a part of this city. It feels as though I am in a new part of Boston trying new foods and meeting new people. With all the similarities though, there were some things that were different. One of the biggest ones honestly was the driving on the opposite side of the road. This really confused me at times and they made sure to make us aware of this drastic difference between London and the US. When walking on the streets, however, the city was nice enough to put in huge block letters the direction in which cars are traveling so when walking you know to “look right” or “look left” when crossing the streets. Lots of tourist that travel into the city, some may get into accidents but they are usually avoided because of caution signs. The currency was another major thing to get used to. The fact that one and two pounds in London exist as coins and the 5 pence coin is smaller than the 10 pence whereas in the US, the nickel is bigger than the dime threw me off. I took me about two weeks to get used the currency and another two to learn how to budget! The scenery was beautiful and I could never get used to seeing things like the London Eye or any of London’s famed museums or landsights. Other than that, the underground Tube system, the accent and slang, the infrastructure, and the cobblestone everywhere was easier to get adjusted to. Overall, the culture shock was not all that shocking!

Written By

Cynthia Orofo

Living in America for the entirety of my life has blanketed me in a shell of American culture and lifestyles. I aim to expand my limited view of the world that I live and learn in everyday and in having the possibility to study abroad, an individual is granted the opportunity to broaden his/her global outlook by experiencing every aspect of that nation’s civilization, culture and society. With this dialogue, I wish to be thrown past my limits and experience first hand what it means to live, work, and learn in an environment completely different from my own. One of my long term goals in life is to better the lives of the deprived and disenfranchised, essentially helping those who may not have or have lost the ability to help themselves. This I aspire to attain later in life by constructing a free health clinic in impoverished villages in Nigeria. This dialogue gives a global prospect on health care systems which can broaden my way of thinking in progress towards a better understanding of the differences in health care systems.