I decided to just pen down - rather type down my experiences on life in London. Having experienced a typical 9 to 5 life for over a week now, I think I am in a reasonably good position to put my thoughts in perspective. London is actually a very nice place. Surprisingly for all the trappings of a colonial power, I find this country and its people more open and more accommodating to expatriates and varied nationalities when compared to even the US which is supposed to be a land of immigrants. You find Londoners (I mean the british) queueing up Indian and Thai restaurants with equal enthusiasm as their favourite pub house. They are very sensitive in treating people well and with courtesy and respect. It is nice to see the police, the train announcer or the guy over the counter in a petty shop address you with "Sir" and end the sentence with a "please" and "thank you".
Things are so well planned. London as I said before is a very old city. There are multiple train routes like the Metropolitan, Jubilee, Central, Bakerloo, Waterloo, Eastern, DLR lines. All of them criss cross the city and are so well knit that you do not need any car in this city. You just buy one card and the same can be used in the buses as well. Safety is given utmost importance everywhere. In fact the other day, there was a story in the BBC about Londoners complaining that there was a bit of an overdose of Safety signs on the road !
I have now got used to the routine. Get into a train at about 8.15am and reach my destination - Canary Wharf at about 9.00. I have to say some thing here. This station - Canary Wharf is an underground station and there are 3 levels of elevators to get to the ground level from the platform! This in effect means they have dug in almost 100 feet below the ground and there are shopping malls, restaurants at the second or third levels below the ground!
Nobody really talks much while we travel in the train. I miss the constant chatter of a typical Mumbai train. People here are so quiet and they just keep reading or listening to music on their iPods. Trains are fitted with automatic doors and hence you cannot have people popping their heads out and hanging out of the doors! Partly because the trains go in and out of the ground.
Ok enough of trains. We have our food at a nearby Indian restaurant called Chennai Dosa. The atmosphere here is very mch Indian and they have put out a poster there - "A sincere advise to our customers - Indian food tastes good when eaten with the hand!" This is directed towards the typical English bred and table manner conscious and fork and knife wielding desi customers !
We normally walk our way back which is a good 25 minute walk. Atleast something to exercise you know. Yesterday there was a big event in the famous Wembley stadium here. This stadium is very near our hotel and we can see it from our rooms. There was an American Footbal match and I understand over 80000 people attended. The amazing thing was there was not a trace of anything after the match once the crowd dispersed. Imagine a trade fair or exhibition in India with such huge numbers attending ! There was no litter and not much noise. I think it has to do with the upbringing.
For all these, it is surprising to see the English talk low about themselves and criticise themselves often. We find it amusing. They tend to look up to other people and countries and criticise themselves. This is all over the TV, paper etc.
For all the good things, any place would be heaven only if you have your people around... and my people are at Chennai and that is still heaven for me...unless they are with me wherever I go !
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