My last blog post seemed to stroll further and further away from the academics of this trip with each paragraph that I wrote, so I will try and stick to the more educational features of this trip for this blog post, as this was something that I enjoyed equally as much (almost, anyway.)
And what better place to discuss academics than the lovely Cambridge. To stroll through this city of a campus just felt right to me, and I wish out of any place we were able to spend more time here. I was fascinated by just how grand it felt with the stories of prominent figures in history like Stephen Hawking and Isaac Newton that the University held, and yet within all of that glory I felt grounded and a part of it by hearing of the lore that certain parts of the city held, such as the bar/inn that must always have the upstairs window open no matter the circumstances, or hearing from our tour guide that one of the university buildings holds the original copy of Winnie the Pooh. I was also more than intrigued to hear that a Master’s degree takes all but one year to acquire over across the pond, and it definitely has me considering my options as that stage of my life looms a little closer with each moment.
I of course couldn’t mention Cambridge without at least mentioning one of my favorite moments of the trips, which was our punting trip that I allowed us to see much of the cities beauty from the relaxing position of sitting in a boat with friends at a slow, soothing pace. While our guide didn’t provide us with a ton of information like it seemed the other boat may have gotten; I didn’t mind one bit. I enjoyed being able to see everything and take it all in at my own leisure, as much of the structured parts of the trip is go, go, go, it was nice to stop and smell the roses for just a moment with some of the people I had now grown very fond of at this point.
Shifting cities, I couldn’t go two whole blog posts without bringing up The Globe. At one point on the trip I had made the argument that while we can see and hear about all of these different aspects of history and various time periods, but we will never know what it will be like to experience an authentic point of view from that moment in time. While I still believe this to be true, the Globe made me realize that all of which I just spewed is almost inconsequential. There is no need to focus on what we cannot achieve when what we can achieve is right in front of our very eyes. That I was able to take in the magnitude and emotions that arose from being in the Globe and seeing one of my favorite Shakespeare plays is more than enough, both in contributing to my understanding of literature and history and just in general. I once again have a lack of words that can describe what it felt like to be apart of that moment, in our own time, was just immeasurable, and it made it even better to be surrounded by people who felt the same exact way.