Up early this morning to explore Newport--the town where I’ll be working--which was very busy in the morning with markets of all sorts taking up the two city squares. The skyline (if that even applies to towns) is dominated by the steeple of St. Thomas's church. The rest of the town lies along the river which is dominated by very large and very aggressive swans. Ducks and their droppings run rampant throughout the streets but luckily there are no pigeons who I’ve grown to fear after traveling in London, Paris, Nice, and Barcelona.
It was only lunch time but people were outside at the pubs visibly tipsy singing about a random soccer match that was going on. I have noticed in town through attendance taking that there are plenty of the elderly, teenagers, young wives and their children, and middle-aged couples, but absolutely no 20-30 year old men and women. England is either fighting another war I didn’t know about or young people leave the island for bigger and better things. Either way it seems it will be difficult to meet people here. On a plus note, there is a McDonald’s in case I haven’t gotten sick of it already, a KFC, and Pizza Hut. There is also a public library, several grocery stores, and a cinema!
I came back and explored the hospital near my apartment. The site accommodates 400 beds and can handle everything except severe burns, open heart surgery, and violent trauma. One of the physicians told me he cannot remember the last time they saw a gunshot wound.
As far as appearances (see picture), the hospital looks nothing like ours in that it resembles a factory or warehouse, there are few windows, and the interior is very narrow and plain. Also next to my apartment are 3 prisons and a secure mental health facility which still uses electroshock therapy for schizophrenics. The island has a large number of the mentally ill and drug abusers as is indicative of most isolated communities I suppose.
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