Scruffy back from big smoke

December 4, 2005

Greetings and salutations people - hope all is grand in your worlds - and that public transport hasn’t robbed you of 5 hours of life as it has mine - right at the death - next train they said - 45 mins on that damn Basingstoke platform waiting for a make believe train in the freezing cold - next stop Narnia.

I return to the village running on empty - a weekend in the big smoke sends me back scruffy with baseball cap hair and three day socks - wallet a bit lighter - eyes a bit heavier - but soul certainly more enriched - I love London and the friends I’ve got dotted around the place.

I took Cassie out for fine Italian dining in Wimbledon on Friday - met up with the cool and califragilistic NML for Fulham Lunching and loafing during the afternoon of Saturday (thanks for a quality time princess!) and then called in on friends in Kingston and Clapham as the night went on - Sunday rocked around and after finally getting to see Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (loved it), I took my scruffy self back via a fecked up south west train network.

Maybe if I lived there all the time and dealt with the day in day out grind, I wouldn’t feel the same - friends of mine that have stayed a while and moved on have all spoken of different aspects, but one binding factor is that it can be quite a lonely place - a mix of so many from such a vast array of countries - it’s not unusual to be an outsider - it’s a city of outsiders in a way - which means that everyone has a kind of head down collar up attitude - my time in Hanoi or Jakarta for example - you are in the minority - the places frequented by the expats were limited to a collection you could count off on one hand more or less - you pitch up there’s a tale to tell as to how you got there - other folk have similar - you mix and blend after a while - cheers style - faces always the same in a city of millions - However, London can be a place were instead of bonding with your fellow man due to your fellow feelings of fish out of waterdom, it’s more a case to feel it’s the norm to be lost amongst the masses.

London - you gotta be there a long while to be local - find your way - know that overground like you know the underground - slowly you build up a knowledge like the taxi drivers - who have to take some sort of exam (the Knowledge) before they can get busy picking up passengers - such is the old century hap-hazard nature of design to the cities nooks and crannies - it’s not all neatly arranged with sensible design such as those grid referenced layouts you find in the major cities of North America - it’s all twisted around and overlapping, chopped and cut, going in one way and then filtering off in another - but the unpredictability is part of the charm I think.

Yet still it all seems pretty easy to get about for a city the size it is - as much of a mess that it looks from Google Earth it does have the basics running the show underneath - something seriously lacking in the big cities of Asia (witness that whole pollution slick making its way through the waterways of China at the mo) - it’s expensive - it’s crowded and prone to delay - but ultimately considering a place with that many people and so much going on - it works.

That’s kinda what I love about London the most - you can get pretty much anything you want out the place - and it’s hugely cosmopolitan - the mix of lingo’s, class and cultures cluttering just one tube carriage - going from Brick lane to Regent Street - Soho to Kingston - Brixton to Kensington - all the same city yet all very different places.

So far I only really know certain areas like the back of my hand - maybe 10% of what the city has to offer at most - I’ll always be discovering with every visit it seems - I know a few places very well on this earth - so much so that I have got them beat - want me to show you around Hanoi and I could point you in the right direction (with the aid of a taxi driver and a few bucks - I’m not the best driver and my sense of direction sucks) - but London I’m always going to be wearing L plates - and happy to do so.