Colors.

The leaves are changing colors. The leaves are falling. The trees are getting bare. The trees are bare. Symbolism. You start at one thing and then progress on to the next. In a never ending cycle, of green to yellow, to red, to orange, to brown, to falling. to dying. to rebirth. But where does the cycle really start? In our heads, it starts at green; life. But it really could start at the last stage, death, or even somewhere in the middle, at orange. Its how you look at it. Green is really somehow the peak of life. Its a young leaf, with a couple hundred days to go until it reaches the yellow stage, which is similar to mid 30's, then you get to orange, mid 60's, and then to red, mid 80's, and then to brown...mid 90's a few days to go.. and then, at the very last moment, it finally lets go, and falls; peacefully, gracefully. Such a sad cycle. but also so very very beautiful. I have never seen the leaves change colors. It is something new to me; but I am ever impressed by how something like this can happen.

 It somewhat represents how we are ever changing.

We go through stages, such as leaves go through their own form of stages.
You can relate the changing colors to emotions, or years of life, or even individual days.

The young person is born, and then has the childhood years, moves on to the teenage years, and then early 20's. Still green at this point. Bright, lively, determined. Moving on to the late twenties, and then into the thirties and then on to the forties and fifties, now in the orange.yellow stage. The late fifties approach and on to the sixties. still orange, bright orange. Trying to make the most out of life, which is why the color is so bright. Then, red, it starts as a bright red, passionate, caring, lovely. And slowly changes into a deep, burnt, rusty red. Old, losing fire, but still just as caring. We are now in the eighties. The color is slowing down to an old, brown color, nineties. still holding on, but requiring more work to do so. That one little gust of wind from the North could be just enough to knock them down. maybe today, maybe tomorrow. But when it happens, they will be ready. They join all of the others of their family tree, extended family, blood related, all of them. The ones who have already fallen. Fallen from their tree of life.

Sweet Serendipity.

Home.

As much as I complain about being in an incredibly small city. Not even a city. A village. Yes, a village. I wouldn't change it for the world. It is so uniquely beautiful here. The grass is bright green. The streets, not so nicely paved, but still useable. The sky, not always blue, but always bright. The houses, oh the houses are just so beautifully and architecturally lovely. The trees, all types of trees. I see Christmas trees, and redwoods, and oak, and of course pine trees. The hills that engulf my little village of Küntrop, are just too marvelous for words. I wake up and look out my window to a breath taking sunrise over the mountains that tower over our village. Pink and orange and purple clouds painted across the sky light up the surrounding villages and villagers who are beginning their day. Driving through them today, was when I realized all of this. I would never change where I am living. At first, I was not very happy with where I was placed, geographically. But now; I really think that this is the most beautiful part of Germany. And I took it for granted. I can't imagine my exchange taking place in any other place. I am so grateful that I am here, in Küntrop. It's beautiful. More beautiful than I could ever describe to you. It is home now. 

Home is where the heart is. This is home. 

It's mind blowing for me to sit and look back on all that I have done. I mean, I think about it and I can't believe how much of the world I have seen; through people, and through physically being there. I mean, I've been in England already, that's a complete different country. And we had To drive through several countries to get to the boat to take us there. I have seen so much of the world in such a short amount of time. It's been 6 weeks and I've embraced over 26 different countries ranging from Korea to Japan to Brasil to Argentina to Canada to Australia to India to even, my own country; The United States of America. These countries are no longer just countries of the world; they are my friends; my family. The world is in my hands. Sweet Serendipity.

England.

Everything is royal.

The streets, the shops, the houses, the telephone booths, the buses, and of course, the people. Everything from the lavish decor of the streets and shops, to the never less than perfect pubs, to the inviting atmosphere of the nightlife. I feel like I'm writing an ad in a tourism magazine. But, it's a definite place to put on your map of places to go before you kick the bucket. I have seen so many things in so very little time. Literally from everywhere in London, you can see the Big Ben; ornamented in all its gold trim and the accent coloring of the brick, along with the always bright face of the clock. It's just impeccably perfect. We walked across a bridge last night and you could see it and its reflection in the river that flowed through and divided London. It was just a perfect sight. the city lit up the water, and then Big Ben rang it's bells. Its really hard to express all that i have seen and felt while being here. and its only our 2nd day here. The Westminster Abbey; we went to a choral service. It was just so wonderful, the sounds and the echoes. Oh it was just an experience that I will love forever. I can't even begin to describe the elaborate and incredibly lavish interior. We were not allowed to take pictures, which was sad, and actually the only time that I listened to someone tell me not to take pictures. It was just so very beautiful. Something that every pair of eyes should see in their life. One cannot express the detail and beauty within this structure. It's just indescribable.

Oxford. How can I even begin To describe this one? Okay, so I've almost decided that this is exactly the place that I want to study for university. Period. The ever inviting atmosphere welcomes you to come in, closer and closer. It's a very beautiful campus and there are many colleges to choose from. It's suitable for any young scholar; like myself. That was a joke. I hope you got it.

Any who, Contrary to popular belief, England is not one big city. London is, but there is much more to England that meets the eye. Yes, that was a pun, the London Eye, I hope you got that one too. But, I have seen the White Cliffs of Dover, which are absolutely breathtaking. They take up a majority of the side of the island we entered. It is so strange to call England an island, because you think tropical, but its actually the opposite. Some beautiful sight. I also have gotten the chance to ride a subway for the first time in my whole life. And believe me, I have done a whole lot of subway riding this past week. I also almost got stuck on the subway while my group had gotten off....story of my life, and a great story indeed. This week we also have to make some sort of music video to "gangham style" and it should be really cool, because our whole grade is basically in all different parts of Europe; we're in England, some are in Ireland, Rome, Austria, Berlin, Poland; all over. All of us are doing the same music video and dance so it'll be like a "world class" flash mob happening all over Europe. I think it's a really cool idea.

Something I have really noticed since I have been here though, is that German people are ridiculously good at figuring out which country people are from. We were sitting at breakfast and my friend pointed out a family and said they were French; not believing her, I waited for them to start talking, and guess what, it was French. And she figured this out, just by their mannerisms. The next day, a different friend pointed out some people and said they were Italian, and believe it or not, they were. It was so fascinating because they literally just watched for a few seconds and they could tell right there, what they were. It seemed so simple.

There is so much more that I could write, but simply, there is not enough time, or space.

Also I have finally had a real diet coke. The world is now back on it's axis.

Sweet Serendipity.