England. a place of beauty. a place chalk full of history, of romance and cobblestones. of white cliffs and pebble-strewn shores. of brilliant sunsets upon a foaming blue sea. of a fast-paced, colorful, vivacious culture. of blaring british pop amidst musty, low-ceilinged taverns. of old brick structures and ancient stone churches .... a place i have become familiar with. a place i have come to miss the most. each day i stepped out my door i was struck by everything that the English would call ordinary, but that i find fascinating. the history. who lived there and what happened here, what must this place of been like hundreds of years ago... it was as if i stepped into a dream- world. one in which castles existed. in which homes and shops remained untouched, as if they stood there 100 years ago, much the same. if i were to remove the cars, the blaring music, the modern day people rushing past... and in their stead i placed a horse-drawn carriage, with a woman in billowing skirts descending and atop her head the most fashionable feathered hat in all of Brighton... a gentleman caller strolling up the lane, catches her just in time.... since telephones are few and computers unheard of he had no way of knowing her whereabouts... those are the images i see inside my head, that's what i imagine when i walk down the lane. to me it seems that the surroundings are so far from reality. that the culture and the age i live in is no match for the architecture, the monuments and statues, churches and castles that surrounded me. this place that i live in day to day is so unchanged, unmarred... well in England that is, yet we are much altered... advanced, far beyond what the world looked like at one time. i love it. i bask, i revel in these places of old.

with a lingering sense of an end i bid england a bittersweet farewell....

Oriental place, Brighton

(sarah's flat)