by Aly Bayliss| Summer 2024 |
I had the opportunity to study abroad with the Art and Design department for seven weeks this summer. My time abroad has taught me so much, and I am so grateful that I was able to make the trip. We went to Oxford, England, first, and I feel like we got to truly be immersed in the daily life there since we were there for three weeks. We got involved in a local church called St. Aldates, and we often visited a restaurant called Viny’s Cafe, where they soon began to recognize us. My experience in Oxford was amazing because we became very independent, especially with public transport, and we got to grow together as a group in the ACU house. We took two classes while on the trip: plein air painting and street photography. I have had both painting and photography classes in Abilene before, but taking these courses abroad is something I am very thankful for. Getting to paint in the open air and learning how to document what I see in a quick manner will be very useful in my course study as a painting major moving forward. For photography, we got to experiment with taking different kinds of photos with different kinds of subjects in scenic locations, which is something that we would not be able to do in Abilene.
After Oxford and a few days in Salisbury, England, we traveled to Madrid, Spain. Madrid was very different from England, but it was very lively, and there was a lot to do. We had four free travel days in Spain, so I decided that I was going to go to the beaches in Barcelona. Learning about public transportation in England made me more comfortable booking a train ticket and traveling to Barcelona. After Spain, we went to Italy, where we stayed in Arezzo but traveled to Florence multiple times.
Italy was one of my favorite places because of the amazing architecture and art museums. We got to see many paintings that we learned about in previous art history classes, and seeing them in person was such a surreal experience. After our time in Italy, we made our last stop in Vienna, Austria. In Vienna, we got to stay at the Oklahoma Christian University house, which we were very excited about because we missed the Oxford house and how we had community spaces to converse and draw in our sketchbooks together. Vienna has amazing food and a great transportation system that we used to explore the city.
This experience was amazing, and I learned how to be adventurous and step out of my comfort zone. I learned so much in my classes that I will bring back with me to Abilene. As a group, we got very comfortable navigating the cities we were in and finding places to eat and shop. This is something that is very helpful to me because we were not only learning how to be independent but also learning to be adventurous and try new things. Many of us did not know one another before our trip, but by the time it was over, we had truly become close friends. The people, the experiences, and the trip as a whole are something I will be eternally grateful for and will cherish forever.
