My time in London is coming to a close. This makes me very sad. When I was trying to go to bed last night, I started thinking about how incredible my London experience has been, and a wave of melancholy swept over me and took a few sleepless hours to wear off.
I underestimated the amount of world knowledge I would acquire from living here. I foolishly assumed that an accent was all that really separated us Americans from our friends across the pond. My studies and travels have shown otherwise. Before living here, I never realized how easy it is to seclude oneself from world affairs when living in the States. Though America is known as a culturally diverse nation, ethinic communities there tend to keep to themselves, and it is easy to foster a false sense of reality by ignoring any issue, person, or situation you don't want to confront. Maybe it's due to the fact that I have been studying multiculturalism in London so much this semester, but it seems to me that London is much more connected to the world pulse than any city in the states, even more so than New York. Its position in Europe makes it a realistic destination for many nations, east, west, north and south, fostering a huge influx of world cultures on the banks of one relatively small river. I hope I don't revert back to my U.S. bubble upon my return.
London, it's been jolly good.
Cheerio!
p.s. I'm leaving you with my favorite diasporic media pastiche ever:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5ky5ClIjL8
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