Hi! My name is Amelia Choi and I’m a junior majoring in Finance & Accounting and minoring in Economics. At Pitt, I’m a member of the Women’s Club Soccer team and Delta Sigma Pi, a professional business fraternity. In my free time, I love spending time with friends, traveling, and staying active!

This semester, I am studying abroad in London through the GBI London program! I had the chance to visit London in December 2024 for a family vacation and absolutely loved it, which was a big deciding factor when choosing where to study abroad. I also participated in the Plus3 Costa Rica program shortly after my freshman year, which was an awesome experience and led me to explore the possibility of a semester-long study abroad program in the future. In this program, I hope to grow both academically and personally and to challenge myself to step outside of my comfort zone by acclimating to a new country and culture. I also hope to see a Premier League soccer game while I’m here, or really any local game!

Here in London, I’m studying at Richmond American University, which is very different from Pitt. Most notably, the campus and student population are much smaller than what I’m used to, but so far I’ve found that I appreciate the smaller and more focused learning environment for a study abroad program like this. The biggest difference has been my commute to campus. At Pitt, classes range from a 5-15 minute walk, but here it takes 45 minutes to walk to campus from my apartment. Thankfully, I also have access to public transportation through the Tube or the bus, which can shorten the commute.

In terms of my apartment, my fellow Pitt students and I are staying at an accommodation called the Stay Club, where we have studio apartment rooms. Living in the same building as the others is nice because we can take advantage of the communal kitchen/living room areas as well. So far, it’s been nice to have the best of both worlds with having my own room but also being able to use the shared facilities such as the kitchen, cinema, and gym in the building. The Stay Club is in a more suburban area than central London, and there are grocery stores nearby that are a 10-15 minute walk away as well as Tube stations and bus stops that are close by. So far, it has been really exciting yet challenging at times to adjust to a new culture and lifestyle, but over the past few weeks, I have been working on developing more of a routine to be able to fully immerse myself in my classes, travel, and new life here in London. Overall, I’m really grateful for this opportunity to study abroad and am excited to see where this semester takes me!