“I’ve lived in France, London, Toronto and now Houston.

I grew up in the UK where I lived for most of my life. I lived in London from when I was around 11 or 12 to when I was 14, and it was great. I went to an all girls secondary Catholic school, so it was different from anything I have ever experienced. It was a very different environment, being in mixed school for my entire life to being with all girls. There was a lot of drama, but I formed really deep relationships that I feel are deeper than the ones I would have formed in a mixed school. It’s given me a real sense of sisterhood.

I moved at 14, the year before I was going to start preparing for my big exams called the GCSEs in England. It was pretty difficult at first – North America is so different, with all the different customs. I had no uniform anymore in Toronto, so I could leave school for lunch. That was unfathomable in England, it’s a lot stricter. I couldn’t even have my phone.

Toronto was amazing. North America has just been more of a fun experience for me, and I feel like I’ve had a lot of freedom here. I had more fun [in North America] than I had in London. My workload in Toronto was a lot easier and not as rigorous as in London, so I had more time to spend with my friends and explore downtown quite a bit.

I feel like it was very difficult to integrate to this school, just because it’s so big and I’ve never been to school with so many people. It was really overwhelming at first, but I’ve met a lot of really great people.

Over in the UK, we would watch many American shows and movies. I watched shows like “One Tree Hill,” “Gossip Girl” and “Hannah Montana.” I just had an expectation of what I thought America would be like. And to be honest, I feel like it lived up to the expectation.

I miss the transportation in the UK the most and being able to be free. I would walk everywhere with my friends. The journey would be the actual part of reaching a destination through bus or the underground train. We would be excited, and I had so much curiosity that going out would just be the destination for me. I could get halfway across the city just by taking the train. It was a good way of knowing my city and feeling comfortable in my surroundings.

In England, they focus very much on everybody being equal. They try to get everybody to be somewhat similar so that no one would feel better than somebody else. And I feel like here, they promote much more individualism and expressing yourself.”