The UMass Lowell Honors College study abroad program gave students the opportunity to voyage far and wide to immerse themselves in the teachings and culture of another country. Each and every day, my classmates and I saw and learned many things as we traveled across Paris. Monday, June 23rd was no different. After meeting up and exchanging pleasantries we visited bookstores and cafes that Ernest Hemingway, author of our assigned readings, frequented. During periods of extreme cold or conditions that were difficult to focus in, Hemingway would often find himself putting pen to paper in a cafe rather than his own apartment, and we found ourselves in those same cafes! It was almost surreal, being able to walk through the same locations this extremely famous writer had, decades before. The fact that this happened internationally, thousands of miles away from home only added to our collective astonishment. 

     While reading his novels, I, as the reader, sometimes had a hard time connecting to Hemingway. He felt faraway, a narrator I could only sense through echos of the stories he created. Walking through areas where he very well may have written those same stories tethered me to him, allowing myself and my classmates to be there with him all these years in the future. I left these locations with the idea that you must put yourself in the shoes, or places of someone to truly understand their intentions and very being. Visiting these places that an author as great as Ernest Hemingway inspired me to review his writing with a clearer lens, as I could see the conditions in which he wrote. 

     During our venture across Hemingway’s typical route, my group and I visited statues, pausing to let our professor give context and overall explain their significance. Typically, I would have walked by these figures without giving them a second thought. These illustrations, however, gave me the chance to really think about what exists around me. I wanted to challenge myself to find meaning in everyday objects I would have otherwise walked right past. It’s incredibly common for large cities such as Paris to be populated with a plethora of trees, large ones that you can see from miles away. I enjoyed looking at trees from away as I walked around the city, up and down and around many different avenues. What I found interesting after staring at a certain group of trees is how clear the outline of one looks from far away. As you move closer to a tree however, you see the jagged disarray of leaves, branches, and stems. This stuck out to me, as I expected to come closer and find everything perfectly trimmed, as I saw from further away. This is where I began to solidify the claim that one has to really zoom in and put themself in a situation before coming to any conclusions and understanding context. Even a city as well loved as Paris has craggy, irregular tree branches, no matter how far you zoom out.

     Our last group observation was located in the Montparnasse Cemetery, where philosophical writers Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir were buried. Their tomb was the most decorated by far, every inch covered in kiss marks, pink writing, and flowers. I had never previously been to a cemetery with intentions of visiting someone I hadn’t known personally so this was an entirely new experience. As our professor contextualized the lives these two led, I though of how melancholy a place centuries were to me. Masses of graves surrounded us, some having been there for over a century. There’s a certain sting of melancholy drifting around every tombstone, resulting in a real sobering effect on anyone who enters. 

     Despite this feeling, learning more about the couple granted me the ability to find strength in the inherent solemnity, as the writing and ideas of these great philosophers is still celebrated and taught today. The outstanding amount of kisses and flowers on their grave instilled hope, as not even death could deny these people of greatness. In the beginning of this sight, I found myself walking into a cemetery and expecting the experience to be sorrowful, as we review the lives of two forgotten, buried souls. Upon zooming in however, really learning about the changemakers they became and ideas they contributed to existentialism and feminism, I found myself at peace, even in a setting as somber as a cemetery. Once again, I am reminded that a keen eye and a willingness to understand can have a powerful impact on the interpretation and overall understanding of a person, or experience.