Wow wow wow what an incredible experience! I’m back home now, and am kind of in shock at how much I experienced during these last four weeks. I knew from day one in London that I would walk out of this experience as a changed person, and I can now fully confirm that. From the sweltering week one in London which nearly gave me whiplash, to our Paris discussions and covid weeks, to our apartment woes (which took the shape of mice), to saying goodbye to everyone at our last Champs de Mars picnic, I feel like time has simultaneously blown by and also passed so slowly. I think Roy said it best- it felt like I was living every minute. And it lent itself to a very full, enriching experience which I will be taking with me going forward! Not just what I learned in class, but also the lessons about how to live. In this post, I want to focus on the three biggest things I’ll be taking away with me as I move on in life. 

First: I really loved spending time with my classmates, becoming friends, and learning with and from them. I’ll admit, I was definitely worried about how it was going to be at first. I went into this experience after two months of planning my own itinerary and mostly living in hostels where I was meeting and leaving people all the time. So I was worried about feeling like my flow was cramped by group things, and was also worried that I would only be able to form superficial bonds and would not be able to make friends. My worries proved useless (as they usually do). The first week of meeting my classmates and seeing them both in and out of class dispelled any concerns about both things. I think everyone was on the same page about wanting to be friends with each other which was really cool and made it easy to accept one another and connect. Even after moving to separate apartments across Paris, people were still proactive about meeting up and doing things together, so it really felt like we were trying to build a community. Making that effort, and having it reciprocated, was awesome for me, who is usually socially anxious and introverted. So yeah, it sounds a little cheesy, but I liked making friends! I also really liked seeing my classmates both socially and academically. I feel like I got to see different sides of everyone with how they were informally versus in class. I have class friends and outside friends and work friends, and they don’t usually mix so I don’t hang out in groups. So taking this class together and getting to know different sides of people, feel out our group dynamics, was really fun. I have felt this before in some other classes, but learning is so much better when it’s with friends! I have definitely had classes where I have been afraid of speaking up because something sounded dumb, or if I felt like I was the only one thinking a certain way, but I think that because we knew each other outside of class, it made it easier for us to get along and have really rich discussions in class. I will possibly try to talk to more people in my USC classes going forward! 

Second: Doing a deep read of the book, noticing the locations described in the book and making connections in the real world to history and the present, was so worth it. I’ll make another humbling admission: I have a super short attention span, to the point where when I have to read for class, I will usually listen to the audiobook at 2x speed while doing like three other things at the same time. So a lot of the time I just get the plot and a sense for the prose. But for this class I really dug into these books, spending a lot of time with them, especially Les Mis. And although I probably could have “gotten away” with reading less in depth, I don’t regret the amount of time and energy I put into reading it. There were so many quote-able moments, or moments where I was like “hold on hold on let me think on that.” Making time for myself to really reflect on the texts instead of trying to read them really quickly just to do it enabled me to get so much more out of them. Also, it was really satisfying when I could recall what happened in a scene off the top of my head, and it allowed me to participate more freely in the discussions and excursions. Even if I can get away with just skimming, I’d like to push myself to read more deeply and spend more time with the text because I will gain more from it. I’m typically worried that I’m wasting my time on books that are “meh”, but it’s a self fulfilling prophecy. I don’t give books a fair shot at teaching me something if I’m breezing through them. I will probably always consider Les Mis as an example of how the more you put into a book, the more you’ll get out of it. And yeah, it brings me no small satisfaction to be able to say that I’ve read it.

Third: The possibility for deeper travel experiences has opened up for me! I really like traveling- I have done some work experiences abroad, some volunteering, a lot of tourism, some normal “just living” in my destination countries… but I have never read a book as a way to engage with the place I visit. It may have been that the books we read were just very history-oriented, but it felt like I was visiting and living in Victorian London and Revolutionary Paris. Which was SO COOL because ordinarily I would have just seen the tourist sites, walked around admiring the pretty architecture, and eaten some relevant food. I feel like the idea of “bookpacking” has unlocked a whole new world for me! I’m excited to do it going forward, can’t wait!

So yeah, I had a really great experience bookpacking London and Paris with everyone! I’m really grateful for our class, for the opportunity to come on this trip, and for the work that Andrew did to create such an enriching experience! I’m also glad to have had the opportunity to reflect on these experiences in the form of blogs- I hope that Future Me comes back to these one day and re-experiences what I’ve been writing about. To Future Me: Be a flaneur, Stay curious, Reflect, Push yourself, Make friends, Enjoy Life!