Once I got my passport and visa, and the date of my departure was fixed, I felt a sense of alienation. I no longer belonged anywhere. Every corner and familiar sights roused affection and nostalgia – an especially beautiful state, known only to the one who is to part from it, never to return. In the glow of this last love, even ugly sights or evil ones looked so beautiful that I could embrace them all. This parting emotion was now and again interrupted by spells of disbelief and doubt. Where was I going? Even though I said I would come back if I did not like England, was it likely once I was there? Who was this Fr. Osbourne? What did I really know about him? From a photograph, his large deep eyes seemed sharp and severe one moment and boundlessly benign at the next. Whatever was the case he was the only person in the whole world awaiting my arrival at the opposite end of the Earth. At this thought I felt comfort and a fatalistic longing.

My reason for choosing the thirty-first of December as the day of my departure had been two-fold. I wanted to belong to my mother country till the last possible hour of that year and to start my second life on the dot of the new one. The other reason was so that I could see the birth of Sŏnhi's baby.

On the twentieth of December, ten days before I was due to go, she gave birth to a baby daughter.

It was past eleven in the night when I heard my brother- in-law calling my name in a grave voice.

‘Sukey, please, come here at once!’ I ran into their room. Her contractions had started.

‘Sŏnhi!’ I went over and seized her hands. The three of us looked at one another and broke into nervous but happy smiles. Our minds were as one in the wish for a safe delivery.

Her suitcase had been packed and ready and it had been arranged for her to be admitted to hospital at any time. We did not know what to do next, so kept glancing at each other smiling. Chinmo looked the most flustered of the three.