And with that, I’m off to the side and down.
Ah, the Flying Castle is so peaceful when things settle down.
It’s like strolling through Paris. You’ve got the Rive Gauche, and the Rive Droite, but you’ve also got the Rive Aderci.
Hah, hah. I kill me.
Okay, a translation: In Paris, La Rive Gauche is the left bank. Artist’s colonies and such. Rive Droite is the right bank. (And Arrivederci means goodbye.)
Here everything differs in time by eight hours. Mid-morning one place is mid-afternoon another. And in the third habitat, it is a quiet and peaceful night.
Whatever is soothing to your mood, you can find it. What you may seek as a snack or tasty delight is available somewhere.
No internal combustion engines here, we have to walk, except for the spherical elevator cars. There are eyelid portals everywhere, to whisk you off to a new excitement.
And yes, there is “atmosphere”. Not just the reconstituted oxygen in our air, but exotic smells of cooking from various cultures all over the Earth, transplanted here for our microcosmic adventuring.
Clothing from half-a-dozen continents, spices, arts, crafts, books and periodicals. Live entertainment, movies, plays, and public activities that no one can decide is serious work or light-hearted entertainment.
Quiet places, too. Labs and studios, scientific production and investigation facilities, astronomical equipment. Serious work, that draws in the serious minds of our young people, who have shouldered the burdens of adult responsibility. (Perhaps the reduced gravity makes that easier?)
It is they who stand ready to repair a meteoric impact, they who maintain the equipment, and service the elevators, and they who venture out into the unforgiving darkness outside.
Everyone contributes. Every one.