Author: Christina Clower | Major: Mechanical Engineering | Semester: Summer 2024

Set of Much Ado About Nothing

I participated in the four-week study abroad program, Theatrein London, during the summer 2024 session. This program sparked my interest for many reasons. First, since I am pursuing a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering with an Aerospace Concentration and a possible minor in physics, there is not much wiggle room in my required courses to take extra courses such as fine arts. I really enjoy live theater and appreciated the opportunity to explore a different academic perspective with both English and Theater courses. Second, I have always struggled with writing. I knew that the Theater in London program was going to require me to write blogs about my experiences. The prompts were fun and interesting and helped foster ideas that made it easy to express my ideas. Third, I find it difficult to communicate with other people.

This study abroad program was limited to a small group, and I was able to get to know several of my classmates. Finally, I specifically chose this program because it meets my specialized needs and provided me with support I needed while I was away from home. Because of my disabilities with autism and severe food allergies, I had never traveled far from home without a family member to help me get adjusted. On the Theatre in London study abroad program, there were two faculty members with whom we traveled to an English-speaking country, both of whom were necessary for my success.

I originally thought that the Theatre in London study abroad experience would mainly include learning about theater, but we learned so much more. We started off learning about British culture and using the tube (subway) as the main form of transportation in London. We had several group dinners at local restaurants and visited an indoor food court and local grocery stores that introduced us to British cuisine. We visited many museums. The British Museum is the oldest public museum documenting human history. I was not expecting it to be so large and have so much knowledge and history. The Victoria and Albert Museum is the largest museum for applied and decorative arts. We also visited many historic sites in London, such as Westminster Abbey, the Tower of London, St Paul’s Cathedral, and Buckingham Palace.

Outside of London, we took day excursions to Hampton Court Palace, Oxford, and Bath. I really enjoyed learning about the purposes of the different rooms in the ancient Roman Baths. Our trip to England ended with a visit to Stratford upon Avon, where we learned about rural English culture and the environment that shaped William Shakespeare.

While in England, I saw 13 theater productions; most of which were in London, but I also saw a few in Stratford upon Avon. I really enjoyed going to see the many different types of shows and dissecting each show, analyzing the different aspects of the performance, such as the script, directing, setting (stage, lighting, and props), and acting. We analyzed and interpreted why different lighting was chosen for certain situations, the way a character was portrayed, set design, and prop usage. Some plays were big productions, while others only had small budgets. Some plays had an intricate stage setting, while others were minimalist. One play we saw was spoken totally in Ukrainian, so we had to use aspects other than language to understand the play. Another play has been running since 1952. Some productions had large casts, while others had small casts, where actors had multiple parts. For our assignments, we were required to write blogs about our experiences as well as analyzing the aspects of different types of plays. The blogs got me more comfortable with writing and many times, the blogs wrote themselves and I ended up writing much more than the minimum required word count. On a few occasions, I had to do research for some of the blogs, like when we had to discuss how an article from the Victoria and Albert Museum connected to one of the performances that we had seen.

I had many fun personal adventures during my study abroad experience. Once I mastered using the tube system and learned a few of the major stops, I was able to explore London on my own. My favorite find was a vegan pastry cafe called Cream Dream. The owners and workers recently came over from Ukraine to open their bakery. They served food, drinks, and pastries. The desserts were very interesting and some of them were traditional Ukrainian desserts. The bakery had a very magical and whimsical feel to it.

I also went to see a fringe theater play by myself called Marie Curie. It was a sudden decision to go to this show, and I was not expecting it to be a musical, but even so, I still liked the show a lot. One of my favorite things about the theater itself was that because it was located underneath the Charing Cross tube station, you could occasionally hear the tube rumbling over your head throughout the show. My roommate and I visited The Sherlock Holmes Museum, located at 221B Baker Street. I loved looking at everything in the museum. All the props used were real artifacts from that time and were set up, so it actually looked like Sherlock had lived there. There were also tour guides that told stories about the items in the house and how the characters used them. I think my favorite thing was a wall of pictures in Sherlock’s bedroom. The guides said Sherlock would refer to the people in the pictures as his family and dear friends, but they were portraits of known murderers and serial killers.

Finally, I enjoyed my visit to the London Aquarium. It was a little difficult to figure out how to buy the ticket, but I figured it out and enjoyed the afternoon looking at the various sea life that lived at the aquarium in the different zones, like the Coral Reef, Ocean Tunnel, and Seahorse Kingdom.