All the World's a Stage

On April 23rd Lena, Anna, Daniel, Aubrey and I traveled to London to see the Royal Shakespeare Company perform King Lear in The Globe Theater. For those of you who are not Shakespeare nerds, April 23rd is Shakespeare's birthday and it also marks the beginning of the Globe's season. So it was a really big day for Shakespeare fans all over the world. The play opened with traditional music, which I captured on video before the play really started. The play was AMAZING!!! We bought standing tickets and the play lasted about 3 and a half hours. So by the end our feet hurt SO badly, but it was totally worth it (for me at least). The acting was superb, it is the kind of acting that I aspire to be able to achieve someday. This was my first experience seeing King Lear staged and it was a wonderful first experience! At the end of the show the actors did a traditional dance. In the olden days they did a dance at the end of a show to show that no one was really dead and to uplift the audience as they left the theater. After seeing King Lear, which is arguably Shakespeare's most tragic play, I was really glad they chose to keep with tradition because I needed to be uplifted! At the end, as the cast took their bows I looked around and saw the three levels of the audience and it was an amazing feeling that canceled out any soreness from standing! It was an amazing feeling and probably one of my favorites of the plays I have seen so far, and I have seen some amazing plays thus far! I look forward to being able to see a few more plays while I'm here.
That has really been one of my favorite parts of my study abroad experience, being able to travel up to London for a day and see a play. I have really enjoyed every piece of theater I have seen here and learned a lot from each one and this has been a wonderful opportunity to live in a small city but benefit from being so close to a major city! I am now in my last month of my study abroad experience and I am starting to be torn. Some days I can't wait to be back home, back with my family and back to driving and normal food...but other days I can't imagine leaving. I have made some really great friends and memories and I have loved my time here! This last month will be a whirlwind, I have a feeling. I can't wait to see what the next month will bring!