Things that changed my brain chemistry this IAP
Life at MIT — more like London
This IAP, I took 21L.591: Literary London, an IAP class where you go to London (surprise) with 14 other students and learn about British literature. I was pretty excited for Lit London, less so because of what it was, and more so what it was not. It was not being stuck at home during IAP. I wasn’t the biggest fan of literature before the 1900s, which is what the class focused on — Anna Karenina was maybe the only exception, thanks to my high school AP English Lit teacher.
I was… pleasantly surprised. Like, a lot. London was fun, obviously. The class, though? Really cool, to the extent that I still attend Lit Teas (which are weekly yap sessions with free food and stellar literary convos in Building 14N). Plus, I got to do a research project about both murders in London (cool) and political commentary in poetry (equally cool). Everyone knows Jack the Ripper and George Orwell, but I learned about some additional cool characters.
For example, I learned about a murder where a maid killed their employer and then pretended to be her for a while, before being convicted in court! And Elizabeth Barrett Browning, who wrote that famous poem that starts, “how do I love thee? Let me count the ways.” She did a lot of cool stuff, like writing political poetry that protested child labor.
Here are some other educational moments, more for me than for you. Names are all pseudonyms!
Tuna and raw onion salads at 2 a.m.? No. Sorry, Jared.
Quinoa bowls from Sainsbury’s at 8:30 a.m.? Yes. Apparently Alex did this too.
Yorkshire pudding is not pudding? Weird, but actually quite good (thanks to Kyle for the pub invite).
Chastised by the front desk receptionist for not signing out when I left the building after class, because if it “blew up or collapsed,” my parents wouldn’t know where my body would be. Well… I signed out after that.
Fast walking in the rain to get to the gym because our apartment (only one of three, mind you) wasn’t attached to the main building? Built character.
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Amazing lunches every day for the second half of Literary London (since we switched classrooms to a cooler location!) Except Jane and I tried ordering paneer fries TWICE and got side-eyed.
I also found it really funny that this one hamburger stand advertised “vegetarian mushroom” on its banner. Like, I get that it means a mushroom burger that is vegan, but it was funnier to think of it as a mushroom that happened to be vegan. I don’t know, maybe there are some non-vegetarian mushrooms, like how some people consider figs to not be vegans because of how they’re pollinated?
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Not picking up on an English accent at all.
A little sad since I live on C2 in Burton Conner. Aka British Floor…
Watching an adapted version of Cymbeline at the Globe Theatre. And realized how cool it can be.
Even cooler: watching Carol reenact a scene from Cymbeline where she took a bracelet off of Tyler, but since we had no bed, Jared, Ben, and Hailey all served as makeshift human beds for the scene. The Globe should take inspiration.
Realizing that Old and Middle English are really hard to parse unless you’ve taken a class (like Jane did). Ahem, Canterbury Tales…
The Westminster Bridge doesn’t look anything like what it did 203 years ago…as per William Wordsworth.
Shopping. But not in Soho. Walked under a canal in Camden and found some random cool things.
Reading sonnets couplet by couplet, popcorn style, with Jared and Emma, except none of us locked in. In fact I think our apartment (212) was the most locked out.
Karaoke that quickly died in the 212 out when we unplugged the speaker from the TV and couldn’t figure out how to plug it back in.
Researching the Camden Town Murder.
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THE TUBE. And I got tube socks. Also, Emma, you forgot your Tube tie (as in a Tube-themed tie.) Please get it soon.
We left the same person behind on the (actual) Tube because she gave up running and instead just waved at us as we zoomed by…
Suspiciously glancing at the Koh-i-Noor diamond at the Tower of London…
Suspiciously glancing at the Elgin Marbles with Jane at the British Museum, which were suspiciously renamed.
AI-assisted Instagram caption ideation for the post-trip photo dump.
Getting last place in pub trivia night! Twice…
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Losing Jared in the National Portrait Gallery.
Jared should NOT be a hard person to lose.
Maybe we lost Jared somewhere else?
We lost Jared a lot of times.
Having random people speak to me in Hindi and Bengali.
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Not hearing Ed Sheeran anywhere, not even malls. Except from Alex, who is a superfan and has done covers of many of her songs.
I won’t dox the videos, don’t worry!
Overall? Lowkey a heavenly experience.