The Higher the Buildings the Lower the Morals

12 November — This past week was reading week here at Queen Mary. Reading week is governed by the same idea as reading days back at Lewis & Clark: some time without class to catch up on work or studying. From what I’ve heard from my fellow Queen Mary students, it is tradition for associate students to take the week to travel Europe, to explore London, and to generally ignore their coursework.

I have a little too much work due in the coming days to completely ignore my work, but I’ve done my best to combine the best of both worlds and have spent the past week exploring what London has to offer in terms of libraries, museums, and simply the physical London itself. A lot of my exploration has been helpful for assignments, and I’ve gotten a surprising amount of research done, so I don’t feel too guilty about the hours I’ve spent in the library (approximately 0.25) or the things I’ve checked off my to-do list (3 of 8).

I’ve seen parts of London I can’t imagine I would have otherwise seen. There’s something to be said for having the time to walk and explore without the immediate pressure of class or society meetings or coursework. London is a lived-in sort of place. London has lived and burned and lived again since the first century CE; coming from America, it is often hard to comprehend the sort of history I am seeing, everyday, with my bare eyes.

And yet parts of London feel plastic. They feel too new. The Stratford Westfield mall is a mammoth: a winding maze of stores and tourists and restaurants and, inexplicably, another one of the chain stores we passed just a few minutes ago. In the semi-darkness of a London night, the McDonald’s in Leicester Square boasts a pristine white and yellow exterior until nearly 3 in the morning.

I was told to expect old when I came to London, nearly 1,600 years of old that we never get at home in the “New World.” But I am reminded time and time again now that I am here that a lot of this “old,” especially the exciting bits, come from the largest empire the world has seen, one with a thorny and complex history of enslavement and colonization.

One of the many places I have visited this reading week was the Museum of London Docklands. The museum is a top-down experience; you begin on the top floor with a gallery on the origins of slavery in the British Empire and the continuing impact on the modern United Kingdom, before working your way down through time. The Docklands museum is a fantastic museum, in particular the first gallery on slavery. It is a thoughtful and informative exploration of how and why Britain became involved in the trade of people. While walking through the exhibit, however, I couldn’t help but be struck by the fact that it took 45 minutes of travel via TfL, plus some wandering around Canary Wharf, and the four flights of stairs it took to get to the top floor of the museum to finally read a placard that explicitly said “slavery is bad.”

Slavery is in many ways the foundation of modern Britain. Slavery funded wide-scale and iconic architectural changes in London, slavery changed the racial makeup of England significantly, slavery brought the funds for continued expansion of the British Empire into the New World and beyond. But slavery is also very bad, and I do not think I should have to look so far afield to find something that acknowledges the massive contribution of the slave trade to what was at the time the world power while also recognizing that it was unequivocally immoral and wrong.

Upon reflection, the plastic of London makes me uncomfortable because it feels like it is missing things. Blink, and the racist and xenophobic slave-owner is being immortalized as a successful businessman. The Museum of London lets you walk through model streets of the past—without the grime and the smell and the communicable diseases, of course. All over London, the past is retouched and retold.

Maybe it is a part of becoming something resembling an adult that has made me more aware of both my own personal history, but also the history of where I am from and the implications of that history. Maybe it is the academic study of history that has inspired me to think critically about how human society has gotten where it is today, has inspired me to explore both the positives and negatives of being a product of America in the 21st century. Regardless: I am conflicted. For a place with so much history, it is amazing how little London seems to be aware of its own past.

—Emma Celebrezze

Entry #2

9 November — In the eight or so weeks I have spent in London thus far I have already found a few of my favorite things. By this I mean I have already found my favorite place to grab a coffee and study, my favorite sushi restaurant, pub, shopping destination, neighborhood... you get the idea. While each of these locations offers me a place of comfort and sense of home, I have made an effort in the last few weeks to see every part of this city that I can in my remaining five weeks (which is too scary to think about).

About two weeks ago, a few of my group members and I took the tube to Liverpool Street to grab some sushi at a restaurant none of us had been to before. The moment we stepped out of the tube station each of us felt as if we had stepped into an entirely different city than when we had entered the Mile End station near campus. The sun had set, and while it was only about six o'clock, it could have easily been two in the morning. Our walk from the station to our restaurant felt almost like an out of body experience, as office buildings towered over us on either side, young business men and women were leaving work and heading into pubs or going home, all in a sort of frenzy. I felt as if I were transported into a dystopian novel, and I found this part of the city oddly intriguing. A few weeks later I returned to Liverpool Street during the day and found it a little more inviting and less as though George Orwell had written about it, but it still presented a great contrast to the London that I am used to experiencing.

Similarly, a few days ago I visited the Museum of London Docklands in Canary Wharf with a classmate. We both had a very similar experience to the time I previously mentioned, and were in disbelief with the feeling we had strolling between office building after office building, seeing nobody under the age of 30, let alone anyone wearing street clothes. I began to reflect on other areas of London that I have spent more time in, and my mind skipped to the evening I spent at the Tower of London on Remembrance Day. While walking on a path through the grass filled with candles it was hard to wrap my head around the idea that I was walking around a fortress that has been standing through numerous centuries of London’s history while still standing only a few miles from Canary Wharf or Liverpool Street. You can even take a look across the Thames as you stand near the Tower and you will see the Shard standing in company with similar incredibly tall glass office buildings. Not to mention St. Paul’s Cathedral which sits at the highest point in the city, as it is one of the most recognizable landmarks in London and one of the dozen projects of renowned architect Christopher Wren. This city has managed to maintain an essence of powerful history while evolving with grand innovation which I don’t expect to ever be used to. I appreciate finding comfort in this new place, and as I explore more of London the more I will have to miss once we depart back to Lewis & Clark.

 —Claire Greene

Life Growing from Hate; A Holocaust Survivors’ Grandson Experiences Germany

7 November — Life in London has been going very well. I’ve been adjusting positively to my classes, going rock climbing twice a week, skateboarding twice a week, staying social and meeting new people. I’ve started to cook vegetarian and have gotten accustomed to budgeting, shopping, cooking and cleaning for myself. Yet I could tell I wanted to see and experience more on this journey abroad then a life in London. So, when reading week came I decided it was time to get out.

First I had to figure out where I wanted to go and then make the plan. My grandma was born in Berlin and was forced to leave when she was a young girl. As a Jew, many of my distant relatives were likely killed in concentration camps in Germany. I felt a strong connection to Germany because it used to be the home of my family and my people before we were kicked out and murdered.  Additionally, a friend of mine from Lewis & Clark was studying in Munich and a friend from Queen Mary was planning a short trip to Berlin. It worked so I could spend the weekend in Munich and then fly up to Berlin for part of the week. The times overlapped so I booked my tickets, found a hostel in Berlin and went off on the trip.

The reality of traveling on your own hit me fast. It turned out I accidentally booked a ticket back from Berlin on Wednesday. I needed to be in class that morning. For whatever reason, even though this is the only week Queen Mary has no class, we have Lewis & Clark’s class Wednesday and we also have LC events planned all weekend we needed to be back for. Needless to say, I was very, very annoyed. But I am a student first, so I spent an extra forty-five euros and booked my ticket back from Berlin (I thought) on Tuesday. Only once I was on the trip did I realize that I accidentally booked my ticket back from Munich and not Berlin! So, I had messed up twice and did not have the money to buy a new ticket on such late notice. I ended up staying an extra night at the hostel and going home on the original ticket and just missing class. When traveling on your own, you sometimes just need to evaluate where you are at, take a step back and move on with the best options. These are skills that I’m happy to have learned young and in college rather than out on my own.

Munich was excellent and I got a picture into authentic German culture. I ate German food, saw modern German art, went to German bars and clubs and learned how to say “thank you” (danka) and “hello” (hallo). Modern-day Germany is a culture so far removed from my own culture and obviously one that I can never understand. To go back to a country that removed your grandparents and enjoy its culture and life is an act of rebellion in my opinion. To simply exist in a space where you would have been murdered if you were there seventy years earlier is quite the feeling.

Berlin continued with this theme as I went to the Jewish Museum. I went alone and at night, which I highly recommend. The Holocaust exhibits are disorienting, confusing and abstract. They’re designed to make you feel uncomfortable, out of place and scared the same way my ancestors felt when the Holocaust happened. The most touching piece of artwork for me was a garden outside that had 48 huge stone pillars that represented different cities Jews fled to after the Holocaust. Inside the museum, but a part of the exhibit, were the names of cities where they fled to. New York was there of course and I just remember walking up to where the name of the city was written down, touching it and having a small cry. For all my heritage to be so closely wrapped in this space was so moving. The museum ultimately spits you out onto a beautiful garden that reminded me of the garden at my Hebrew School. It is filled with trees and grass and shows that no matter what happens, no matter how we are moved or killed, life still rebuilds and finds a way.

The trees in the garden of the museum, the nightclubs in Munich, the rhythm of the Berlin subways and buses, they all made it clear that Germany is a country that moves with life. It does not let its destructive past define it and instead it moves on to a better inclusive and exciting society. By traveling to the land of my ancestors, I felt this reconnection and understanding that life does and will move ahead even in the face of the purest forms of hate.

—Dan Koster

However

5 November — London isn’t for everyone. That makes sense. Sushi isn’t for everyone. Skydiving isn’t for everyone. Salvador Dali isn’t for everyone. I’m not sure why I didn’t think to apply the widely understood concept that not everyone likes everything to the city, though the fact that most people I spoke to before I left told me how great London is and how I wasn’t going to want to leave and that I would come back to the States a changed person. That last point is probably true; I have grown a bit in the past two months and have learned a lot about myself. One of the things I have learned is that I never want to live in a city.

Before coming to London, I tried to keep my expectations at bay. Despite that, there was part of me that hoped my future self might end up in London as an editor at a publishing house (a girl can dream). Or I started to wonder if London might be the place to apply to grad schools for an MA in Literature or Gender & LGBT studies. My academic and professional goals were excited by the city—I would have access to more diversity than I could fathom and might begin to navigate the intricate spaces and social groups that intertwine in London’s demographic tapestry.

Somewhere along the way I guess I must have “forgotten” that I am a quiet, highly sensitive introvert. Loud, crowded places make me uncomfortable. Scotland (especially the Highlands) satisfied my desire for greenery and nature. The landscape was calming and we spent a disproportionate amount of time in small towns. I loved it. So much of me felt nourished and comforted because it reminded me, in ways, of the parts of Idaho that I hold close to my heart.

The first two weeks in London were overwhelming. I had never been around so many people in my life. I was unaccustomed to the smells, noises, and general atmosphere of the city. Things calmed down once classes started at Queen Mary because academic arenas are familiar to me, even though the structure of my classes here differ from the ones I take at Lewis & Clark. My process of getting accustomed to “city life” began when I started to look for things that were less unfamiliar or overwhelming than other things: museums, cafes, parks. These are still the places I go when I feel homesick for a bit of quiet, or a bit of greenery, or my favorite coffee shops back home.

London isn’t for me: BUT, that comes with a huge “however.” I am so grateful to be here because I have access to a multitude of resources for things that I care about. When people ask me why I chose the London Humanities Study Abroad program, I bring up my major. I have been reading and loving books since I was three and I adore my English major because I get to think about the way words and literature affect society. Within London itself I have access to not only numerous manuscripts, but the pub Charles Dickens spent time in and Virginia Woolf’s house. I can take the train to the Bronte Parsonage Museum in Haworth or go to Oxford to see where Lewis Carroll and J.R.R Tolkien created some of the most well known fantastical worlds. On those train rides I get to see the countryside, a beautiful landscape dotted with church steeples that vastly differs from my experience driving across Idaho (where the brown landscape is dotted with dairy farms).

London is known for its night life. On Friday and Saturday nights I see groups of people my age dressed to go out to the seemingly infinite number of pubs and clubs. They’re laughing and having fun and probably (definitely) a bit intoxicated. From what it seems, the evenings serve them well most of the time. I can appreciate wanting to get dressed up, go out, and dance until tonight becomes tomorrow, but let’s be honest: that isn’t my scene most of the time. I felt uneasy about this for a little while, as if someone might tell me off or say that the reason I’m not getting on with London is because I don’t go out enough (or, God forbid, that I don’t drink). But I shouldn’t have to change myself in order to like something. I’ve traded the loud top 40’s beats in a basement for a café a block from King's Cross Station that plays The Internet and has a hummingbird painted on the wall. I’d go for the walk at 9 am on Saturday mornings to a row of coffee shops not far from our campus over the cold walk home from Mile End station when its dark and after midnight. I’m lucky enough to be able to watch the sunrise from my kitchen in Pooley undisturbed.

I love hearing different accents with every coffee shop I step into. I know that if I need an hour or two of quiet, I can go to a museum and wander or sit. London has a lot to offer everyone. Whenever someone from back home asks how I like it here, I answer them honestly. I try not to gloss over the fact that I am not a city girl. Then I immediately tell them what I have liked, the surprising opportunities I have stumbled into (like a Queer Women’s Media Convention, fantastic theatre productions, a concert by my favorite artist that made me cry). I am saying “yes” more and pushing my boundaries, challenging myself to find parts of London that gratify me as a quiet person. That can get exhausting, and sometimes I just wish I was back in a place where I could actually see stars at night.

I don’t hate London by any means, and I don’t know if I will get a full view of what it has to offer before I leave. There is a lot of good here. I just thought that I would like it a little more by now. My relationship with London sounds like some break-up letter: “It’s not you, it’s me” and “I think we just want different things.” I like that being here has given me the opportunity to connect with a smaller group of people from Lewis & Clark, and I now have a greater appreciation of the things that are distinctly “Portlandian” or “Idahoan.”

I am not going to like everything I try. However, I would be more concerned if I wasn’t trying anything. I find ways to broaden my view of the city and England. I approach every new experience with an open mind. What more can you do?

—India Roper-Moyes

Entry #2

2 November — I've never been someone who was naturally interested in history. Growing up, I would always be easily distracted and lose my attention when stumbling upon random facts or reading captions at history museums. If the topic or period was not related to me, my country, or my interests, then what was the point? My category of "relevant" was very limited, confined to what I thought "everyone has to know" and what little caught my attention. And unfortunately, I wouldn't be honest with myself if I didn't admit that this attitude has carried on into my present.

Sure, my understanding of what is "relevant" has expanded. Not only have I learned the value of other aspects of my identity but I have understood the relevance of understanding those of others. Moreover, understanding how we understand history is something I have recently adopted into how I learn about the past, as it is a constant talking point at my history seminars at Queen Mary. Nonetheless, I still need to affix a clear purpose to my study of a certain historical period, event or figure.

Because of this mindset, I often find myself struggling to relate things back to a purpose. Unfortunately, knowledge is often the means to an end, rather than an end in itself. There is also a clear expectation in my mind about finding something in history that other disciplines cannot, as though the discipline was a wise elder from whom I demanded answers to questions about the chaotic and the dumbfounding aspects of our present. But, the way in which we have been learning about London have sparked a kind of new attitude in me.

I realized this change in perception just fairly recently.  Just today, while waiting for the bus, I asked myself “Why did I find history to be boorish at times? It's literally the compilation do the stories of people and places!” What the historian does is something fascinating, a systematic mapping of the stories of humanity and the world.

I can characterize these past few weeks of history lessons as a process of patient discovery, attentive listening and careful observation.  Walking through the streets of London has turned somewhat into detective work for me, an exercise of careful observation and purposeful imagination. Sure, it's impressive to gaze at the grace and beauty of Westminster (which, I'm not gonna lie, is one of the most beautiful pieces of architecture I have seen) or to stand on the Prime Meridian at the Greenwich Observatory, but it is through the less obvious discoveries that I find myself appreciating history for the sake of the subject matter. To try to imagine what the little street, on which the Great London fire started, would look like back in 1666. Or to fathom the many phases that St Paul's went through to stand as it does today (it was torn down and built around several times).

Today, my walks and strolls in London are very different than from a month ago. My gaze sets upon more buildings, streets and alleyways. I find myself asking questions not to know the answers relevant to my present, but to understand the true nature of what surrounds me. To understand London for the sake of London, which was surprisingly led me to understand a lot more than what I thought I would.
 

—Emma Franco Ceceña