sent from: Mortimer Street, London, UK. destination: Los Angeles, California, USA

The first 6-12 months in Los Angeles, I resisted. Accents grated, I tripped over new words, felt superior to these Americans. I avoided the beach, spurned the ocean, cursed the sun, spent most of my time lamenting what I didn’t have, upset that it wasn’t more like Europe. I couldn’t enjoy it, it mean accepting that there were good things there, I would be ‘going native’. “And whatever you do, an old friend warned darkly, don’t pick up an American accent.” Well, now a few months into being back in the UK, I miss the sun, my friend the ocean waves, I am missing the Thanksgiving I wont be having, the smell of cinnamon and pumpkins, and I flinch when I hear some English accents ~ “oh dahhhhling, yeah sweethearrrrrrt…”