View of Bavaria from plane
I just spent this past summer living and studying in Munich, Germany, as part of the Munich Summer Curriculum Program hosted by the Electronic Media Division of the College-Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati. After taking German language and media classes, we took Electronic Media classes with professors from both UC and Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, where we were studying.
The summer was well worth it, albeit long and trying sometimes. I think that the best part about studying abroad for long periods of time is that you get to just about assimilate yourself into the culture surrounding you. We had to learn how to do day to day tasks like going to the grocery store and getting haircuts in a culture that was just different enough from our own to make things interesting. I fell in love with Munich and the German lifestyle to my own surprise, and would instantly return to the city if the opportunity arose.
Field outside of church in Bavaria. We stopped here on our way back from Wittenberg.
Munich was a perfect opportunity for me to learn to be independent. I discovered what made me happy, what I missed about the States, and what I want to do as a career. When you are isolated in a different culture, you learn more about yourself than you can when you are surrounded by friends, family, media, and distractions.
The Sunset over one of the structures left on the Acropolis in Athens.
Another big part of this isolation/discovery was traveling to different cities and countries during my time overseas, which allowed me to see other cultures and and be more aware of different ways of life. I was fortunate enough to travel to Athens, Greece and visit a friend there. The town was amazingly huge and confusing, but it was a great time and extremely interesting. While in Munich I was able to understand how to get around with my basic knowledge of German and reliance on cognates, but in Athens everything was written in Greek…so even if you got directions from someone and you could understand how the words sounded, it would not help you find that street sign full of deltas and sigmas. It was definitely an eye-opening experience.
I have been fortunate to get to travel so much as a student, and hopefully I will return overseas sometime soon. I feel that my time spent in Munich was extremely worthwhile and will be something that I remember for years to come, but I think I am ready to move on with my career and do something that directly benefits it next summer…Los Angeles, perhaps?
View from the Acropolis of Athens. The city was absolutely enormous.
