Londonward

I realised that while living in London, I had yet to see it during daylight hours from the air. The clouds hung low but through scattered holes rows and rows of semi-detached houses could be seen, bordered by collections of a half-dozen tower blocks every now and then. Organic, almost fractal-looking streets stretch until the horizon in all directions. Through it all snakes the Thames like some purplish blue ribbon. It was quite impressive, and really gave some perspective. It wasn’t as pulsing with energy as landing on a clear night and seeing a vast sea of lights, but the sheer mass of humanity occupying and modifying the area was clear during the day.

I had a strangely American-style (for London, at least) weekend. On Saturday I ended up going for drinks at the Big Red, which sports pin-up girls, pinball machines and rock chicks behind the bar, as well as a hard rock (occasionally Southern rock) soundtrack. A pleasant enough place with its semi-dark sitting area and pool tables at the back, the only problem being the trek up to Holloway from South London where I currently reside.

On Sunday I had to divide my time between two birthday parties. One was at a bowling alley in Bloomsbury. They had awesome old Brunswick posters and served stuff like nachos. The other party was “The feast of 1000 beasts” (or rather, of 24) - that is, a barbeque party with 24 vertebrate meats on offer. Quite interesting, and certainly out of the ordinary. A fantastic idea for a birthday party, if a little questionable environment-wise (flying in fresh kangaroo meat) and ethically (though meat is undeniably pretty tasty).

And on the train back from the latter, as rain battered the darkened London cityscape, I decided I needed a break, and booked tickets to Finland to get some last whiffs of Northern summer.

“The Chinese people didn’t see the security clashes, the troubles [during the relay, especially in cities such as London]. What they saw was their olympic flame traversing the world”.

I can’t say I’ve noticed, but apparently prostitution is rife again in my stamping grounds. By stamping grounds, I mean the common I jog and wheeze through when I force myself to do a bit of self-torture. The news insert I watched tonight featured familiar street crossings and sly panning of obscured females walking. They really made it seem seedy, which is completely opposite to what I’ve felt living in the area. Now, I don’t have kids who might stumble across prostitution paraphenalia like discarded condoms and possibly more nefarious things like used needles. But it seems like while having a set of community officers (to my understanding, essentially neutered half-cops) replace a hardened vice squad is really stupid, so is the presence of a focused vice unit. Driving off visible prostitution will only drive it underground. Would it not be better to have proper patrols and assistance with getting off drugs and turning tricks?