5 surprises moving from New York City to London!
24 April 2026 London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine https://lshtm.ac.uk/themes/custom/lshtm/images/lshtm-logo-black.png
When I received the chance to study at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, I jumped at the opportunity. I had just finished my undergraduate degree in New York City and was ready to study across the pond and experience a new city with its own unique eccentricities. I was expecting the motion and excitement of living in New York to translate into London life, and while it did, living here is very different. Here are five surprises I’ve discovered while transitioning to life in the UK:
London sprawls compared to NYC, with lots of parks and green spaces
Despite New York and London having similar populations, they are dramatically different places to live in. New York is very dense and climbs upwards, with high rises and skyscrapers, especially in Manhattan. London sprawls horizontally, about twice as large as all the NYC boroughs, with wide sidewalks and lots of scattered parks. Despite it being overcast most days, London seems less dark with how much of the sky you can see!
The sprawl makes the city feel calmer and more breathable compared to the compact grid of Manhattan. London doesn't really have a single center, more like little villages that grew over time with unique charms and windy roads combining into a bustling metropolitan area. I do miss the ease of the NYC grid system and simple subway lines compared to the tube, but the green spaces and parks, especially one of my favorite and close-by parks, Hampstead Heath, make the city greener. Instead of one Central Park, every neighborhood seems to have its own smaller green space; there are five great parks just a few minutes away from the School.
Traveling!
Traveling is super easy and affordable compared to the United States. London, especially St. Pancras and King's Cross Stations, open up massive opportunities via train to explore the rest of the UK, even out of the country. It’s less than 2 hours to Lille, France, on the Eurostar and only a bit longer to Paris.
Europe is relatively dense and has tons of budget airlines, making trips affordable and short. It’s common to find round-trip flights to Venice from £30 or to Stockholm for £25; I went with my friends to Mallorca for about $40 during the off-season in November, thanks to flight search engines and a budget airline!
Another top tip is the 16-25 Railcard (which all full-time students are also eligible for, regardless of age)! I attach it to my Oyster card for one-third off on most tube trips and trains within the UK. One trip to Edinburgh or even a few trips inside of London can pay off the relatively small cost of the railcard; personally, it’s more than a student perk but a travel investment perfect for daytrips!
Young people's discount
Many museums in London are free, but the ones that are not often offer a “Young Persons’ Discount” for those under 25! This was not unheard of in NYC, but it’s everywhere here; sporting events and theater shows are also heavily reduced, with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra offering tickets below £10.
New Favorites: Pub Quiz
I love trivia, and London is the place to be for Pub Quiz - a typically weekly event in pubs that is a keystone of British culture! Unlike bars in the United States, pubs are more like a warm neighborhood gathering spot, with families with kids, local football fans, and students enjoying a meal or watching matches together. A pub quiz is like a trivia night, but well attended by a wide variety of people. The one my friends and I attend often runs over capacity and has to limit the number of teams. It’s one of the small traditions that makes London feel like home faster; whether you win or lose, it’s always a great time!
Graduate School in the UK is so different
Coming from a medium-sized college in a larger university, a lot of my courses were held in lecture halls and had seminars where we would meet up in a smaller group, maybe 20 or 25 students (depending on the class). It was attached to the course but not integral. At LSHTM, the seminars are pretty small; my Applied Communicable Disease Control module has groups of 8, and it is a fundamental part of the curriculum. The seminar for this module is a project-based learning, where we are given a simulated outbreak, and students act as a health protection agency. Other module seminars focused on analyzing literature from the lectures or talking through problem sets in groups.
Unlike in undergrad, where a lot of my courses were graded through multiple-choice exams or filling out chemistry reaction diagrams, my modules so far have had written assessments to test our critical analysis and synthesis in one paper, rather than multiple midterms and finals. It’s higher stakes having 100% of your grade in one assignment, but the modules are fast-paced, and the prompts are typically pretty open within the scope of the course. For example, last semester, the Health Systems module allowed us to write an editorial on any topic with a framework from the module. It gave a lot of freedom in our topics, and I wrote about Ebola preparedness in the United States, while my friend talked about the differences in countries' vaccination schedules based on their health system model. It was nice to read and see how my friends in the same course came to different essay topics based on our interests.
Living and studying in London has been an incredible experience so far, and I can’t wait to spend the final months here for my Summer Term modules and summer project at LSHTM!