My name is Maggie Nugent, and from the 9th of January to the 7th of June, I was incredibly lucky to call Glasgow, Scotland, my home. Glasgow is on the west coast of Scotland, just a fifty-minute train ride away from Edinburgh (which I visited frequently). Glasgow is considered by some to be the second city of the British Empire, and it certainly does seem that way with all of the Gothic Revival architecture present throughout the city.

I lived in the neighborhood of Yorkhill. It’s right between the rivers Kelvin and Clyde and is just a ten-minute walk away from Glasgow’s most prominent university: The University of Glasgow. I studied at the University of Strathclyde in what is called Glasgow’s City Centre, which I went to every day through Glasgow’s amazing loop of a subway system.

Even before beginning to plan my study abroad experience in the spring and summer of last year, I knew that I wanted to live within a Celtic culture. I’m a third-generation Irish-American, and my Global Theme is Culture and Politics, so I wanted my study abroad to reflect the cultural connections I already had while also introducing me to the ways that the cultures are expressed within their countries of origin. When I was younger, and when I would imagine myself studying abroad, I always imagined studying in Ireland. But thanks to the constant pleading from my very best friends who just so happened to live in Glasgow, I applied to study in Scotland at the University of Strathclyde.

Coined by natural philosopher John Anderson in the 1790s, Strathclyde is known as “The Place of Useful Learning,” which I can tell you without a doubt was the kind of learning I had while studying there. I studied history at the University of Strathclyde, and my classes included classes on War and Society, British Colonialism, and a general crash course on British history in the modern era (which is something I most certainly needed). During my time at Strathclyde, I wrote a lot of academic papers regarding pieces of history that I would’ve never known about if it hadn’t been for the classes I took (if you ever want to learn about the different ways in which enslaved Jamaicans engaged in acts of resistance, I’m your man!)

One of my favourite assignments that I had to do at the University of Strathclyde was for my British Colonialism class, in which I had to go to the Kelvingrove Museum and present on an object currently on exhibit. The museum is one of the most beautiful museums I have ever been to, and I was lucky enough to be inside the museum during one of their daily organ recitals. To hear beautiful music coming from an organ as I walked past Rembrandts, Van Goghs, and Dalis was an experience I won’t soon forget.

I would consider my study abroad experience to be incredibly out of the ordinary. Rather than living with other international students in university housing, I lived with friends. I never experienced the emotions presented in the graph of Professor Udo Fluck. And probably most importantly, I never felt homesick. Because Glasgow felt like home.

It still does.

Classes at the University of Strathclyde ended in early April, and my exams didn’t begin until the 10th of May, so I had a LOT of time to explore Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom! I went down to Manchester to see a play with a friend. I hiked along a beach to see a crumbling castle on a cliff. I traveled to London and saw War Horse at the National Theatre. I took the train to Edinburgh whenever I could, including to Dean Cemetery to lay flowers down at the grave of a polar explorer. But my favourite thing I ever did was making it to a place I’ve had on my bucket list for ages: Loch Lomond.

To quote a traditional Scottish folk song: “There is an old Celtic belief that when a man dies in a foreign land his spirit returns via the low road. In 1745, two Scottish soldiers were made captive in Carlisle; one of whom was to be set free, the other executed. It is the condemned man who’ll return to Scotland by way of the low road of death and reach Loch Lomond before his friend who must travel the earthly high road.”

Hiking around Loch Lomond gave me a lot of time to reflect on how I had made it to Scotland. In the six months I lived in Glasgow, there was never a moment when I was not in awe of my city. It’s that love and appreciation that I’ll hold in my heart until I am back in that Dear Green Place.