(no subject)

I'm not sure how to feel about what's going on in England at the moment. Somehow it's more immediate to me than violence elsewhere; I'm English. I was born there, most of my family lives there, as an Anglo-Quebecker it's a huge part of my identity, and I've spent a greater amount of time there than the average Canadian. While my family doesn't live in any of the cities which are currently experiencing riots (the closest family members to London, for instance, live in Reading), I've got friends living in London, including my first boyfriend, his wife, and their baby daughter. He and his wife work in the Square Mile. My aunt and uncle and cousins will be travelling through Manchester tomorrow, quite early, on their way here.

It's so strange, looking at the pictures. I've never had a rose-coloured view of the country I was born in, but the images are shocking to me. These are places I've been to, places I know, places I've wandered around by myself and got lost in. I've caught trains at that tube station, eaten at that restaurant.

It's so hard to reconcile what's going on with my mental concept of England.