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I don't know how to describe it to someone who's never been there. I've been in cities before, of course: Glasgow, Dublin, Edinburgh, Toronto, Derry, Pittsburgh...I lived in Belfast. London's bigger than any of them. Belfast is a tiny city, squeezed between the Lough and the hills on each side. Everything is red brick. London sprawls enormously, like Glasgow in that way, but more dense. Every building is around eigth-twelve storeys high. Chief impression of it was how squashed everything seemed. And I thought Dublin's traffic was bad; compared to London it's calm and tranquil. Red double-decker buses and black taxis cram the streets. They're sometimes narrowish streets, too, and hive with pedestrians. There are lots of crossings where there's no pelican red and green men (Walk/Don't Walk lights), although at Hyde Park Corner there were red and green bicycles and horses as well as the normal pedestrians. Also, all the shopping streets in the centre of the town are just streets; nowhere is pedestrianised.
I was surprised to see Ann Sommers with some of its more risqué underwear right out on Oxford Street; in Belfast it's tucked round a corner in a side street, and the more normal stuff is in the window. I saw a couple of American tourists eye-boggling at it as well, and, to nicely underline the decadent West, a couple of girls in hijabs going in. That's another thing, I never saw as many Muslims in my life before. Belfast is predominantly white (where it isn't being green or orange), for the simple reason that during all the Troubles migrants went out of the country. You'd have to be a pretty desperate asylum seeker to want to come to live in Belfast during the Seventies. Mostly anyone who isn't white is Oriental of some kind (all the ones I meet seem to be Korean, but someone must have opened those Chinese restaurants) with a few Asians, especially in the university. It was actually a shock for me to see Asians doing menial work. Anyway, in London there are Muslims everywhere, it seems, Arabs and Asians, and lots of the most upmarket hotels and streets. Oil money, I suppose.
There was another even dodgier shop, called Agent Provocateur, and one could see why. My mam was just about covering my fourteen-year-old brother's eyes as we walked past.
Anyway, we went all over the place, on foot and on buses. Our feet almost fell off. We lived off Marks and Spencer sandwiches so as not to be bothered with restaurants. I never thought I'd see the day when I was buying M&S food because it was cheap.
We went to St Paul's Cathedral, but didn't go in because it was too expensive. It started to bucket as we were taking photos of the outside, so we dashed for cover in the crypt, which is now a restaurant. My dad was making references to money-changers in the temple. It really must be hard to keep functioning as a church when it's a major tourist attraction. We were at Westminster Abbey too, and they were trying to hold a service, and the poor young cleric at the door was having to turn away hoardes of tourists. It clearly said the opening times, too, and this was after them. I think if I were them, I would abandon the cathedrals to the tourists and go and worship elsewhere.
We walked along the Thames from the City to Westminster, which is a good way to see the centre of London. The Thames is the dirtiest river I have ever seen, and I've seen the Liffey and the Lagan mouth and whatever the rivers in Pittsburgh are.
One of the weirdest things was to walk along streets that I'd only heard of on a Monopoly board! Oh, and we went and found Audley Square and 112 Picadilly (which is actually a hotel). And we found lots of mews with cute little cottages. Although I doubt Bunter's was 'cute'. It's not a word one associates with Bunter.
I was surprised to see Ann Sommers with some of its more risqué underwear right out on Oxford Street; in Belfast it's tucked round a corner in a side street, and the more normal stuff is in the window. I saw a couple of American tourists eye-boggling at it as well, and, to nicely underline the decadent West, a couple of girls in hijabs going in. That's another thing, I never saw as many Muslims in my life before. Belfast is predominantly white (where it isn't being green or orange), for the simple reason that during all the Troubles migrants went out of the country. You'd have to be a pretty desperate asylum seeker to want to come to live in Belfast during the Seventies. Mostly anyone who isn't white is Oriental of some kind (all the ones I meet seem to be Korean, but someone must have opened those Chinese restaurants) with a few Asians, especially in the university. It was actually a shock for me to see Asians doing menial work. Anyway, in London there are Muslims everywhere, it seems, Arabs and Asians, and lots of the most upmarket hotels and streets. Oil money, I suppose.
There was another even dodgier shop, called Agent Provocateur, and one could see why. My mam was just about covering my fourteen-year-old brother's eyes as we walked past.
Anyway, we went all over the place, on foot and on buses. Our feet almost fell off. We lived off Marks and Spencer sandwiches so as not to be bothered with restaurants. I never thought I'd see the day when I was buying M&S food because it was cheap.
We went to St Paul's Cathedral, but didn't go in because it was too expensive. It started to bucket as we were taking photos of the outside, so we dashed for cover in the crypt, which is now a restaurant. My dad was making references to money-changers in the temple. It really must be hard to keep functioning as a church when it's a major tourist attraction. We were at Westminster Abbey too, and they were trying to hold a service, and the poor young cleric at the door was having to turn away hoardes of tourists. It clearly said the opening times, too, and this was after them. I think if I were them, I would abandon the cathedrals to the tourists and go and worship elsewhere.
We walked along the Thames from the City to Westminster, which is a good way to see the centre of London. The Thames is the dirtiest river I have ever seen, and I've seen the Liffey and the Lagan mouth and whatever the rivers in Pittsburgh are.
One of the weirdest things was to walk along streets that I'd only heard of on a Monopoly board! Oh, and we went and found Audley Square and 112 Picadilly (which is actually a hotel). And we found lots of mews with cute little cottages. Although I doubt Bunter's was 'cute'. It's not a word one associates with Bunter.
