So this is Norwich

A Pen Portrait of Norwich by Angie Jones…

I am sipping Kokoa extra dark hot chocolate, topped with swirls of cream and melting, pink and white marshmallows. It has a strong, almost bitter taste. I gaze over the top of my jade cup through the rain-splattered window of the Refectory. Beyond trees daubed with orange and yellow leaves are the shining wet slate and pan-tiled roofs of Cathedral Close. If I look above my head, to the skylights, the spire of the mighty nine-hundred year old Cathedral itself points to the heavens. I take a bite from my cherry and toasted almond slice. A screen tells me that there is organ recital today at lunch time. Shall I go, or not?

I wander into the city, passing the 1854 bronze of the Duke of Wellington perched on his plinth amidst the dainty silver birches, before I pass beneath the elaborately, arched gateway with vaulted roof and cobbled floor. An artist paints behind an easel. Umbrellas bob along the pavements hiding people’s faces; heads are bowed.

It is late October, the kids are in school and the streets are fairly quiet. Smokers sit huddled together in solidarity; outside a café, a thin wisp of smoke blends into the damp greyness of the day. An elderly man trails in the wake of his dyed-blonde wife. He is bearing shopping bags. She is on a mission.

So this is Norwich.

Read the full article in the January 2016 issue of Suffolk Norfolk Life Magazine