October 2008 Archives

I've become citified again. No longer do I cross the street with mouth agape, staring in wonder at buildings more than four stories high. Already I sneer at those people, and know that stories is spelled storeys in this neck of the woods.

Living in a huge city is like having a big, fat scab. When I first arrived, I was like a raw nerve, the twitching whiskers of a mouse waiting to get trapped. (Incidentally, I know a lot about mice after living on Piccadilly Circus for the last few weeks.) The only way you can survive in a large city is with a substantial layer of scar tissue and a heavy set of blinders. If you ever stopped for even a second and thought about how you practically have your head in someone's armpit on your morning tube commute, you'd grow hysterical. If you admitted to yourself that a man less than 7 inches from you was picking his nose at 8:15 in the morning, or that you just stepped over a bloody pigeon carcass, or that you spend $10 a day to take the subway, or that your housing crisis has left you living in a room with no windows, you might just have to die in response.

By keeping quiet and not acknowledging that there's anything wrong, you become a member of the secret society of city dwellers. This gives you access to pissing away 40% of your pay on rent, but also a plethora of delivery food options. I think it's worth it.

"What are we all doing here?" my friend Jenn would ask dramatically when we lived in New York City. "Why are we doing this to ourselves?" It was her theory that living in New York was a form of masochism--we only did it because we felt that on some level, we deserved to be punished. Combined with a healthy dose of something to prove, and that's half of New York summed up. Otherwise, why would we have moved from our great suburbs, our roomy, new homes with affordable groceries and warehouse stores?

First, I learned that in my flatshare queries, there were certain things I should leave out of my emails. Like the fact that I'm an American. Like my grossly semetic last name. These are things that my housemates don't need to know until after I move in. Once they cop on to my accent and maztoh balls, they're going to be in for a surprise.

I had a relocation company ostensibly helping me with my home search. They were very eager for me to live in either Clapham or Islington, but not the place that my I had my heart and wallet set on, the East End. They finally agreed to take me on a tour of different neighborhoods to help me better decide where I wanted to live. As part of the deal, I was given an unrepentant racist as a tour guide.

Immediately after we started off on our tour, Stephanie said, "So you've been living in Ireland...how did you find the Irish? Are they as bad as everyone says?"

I wasn't really listening, so just assumed she was asking what everyone always asks "Are the Irish as friendly as everyone says they are?"

I started my usual response, "Yeah, yeah, they're real friendly" and Stephanie interrupted me.

"They're sort like how you feel about Mexicans in the States, aren't they?"

I still couldn't fathom that this woman would be saying something so beyond acceptable to a complete stranger, and assumed she must mean that both the Irish and the Mexicans have had a positive effect on the nearby dominating super power.

But later, when she started complaining about the blacks, muslims and Jews, I started to realize that Martin Amis was right, pussies are bullshit.

I spent four hours with this woman, getting driven around London hearing about how to best avoid anyone with a skintone darker than myself, and how immigrants were ruining the country. Probably not the best person to be doing orientation tours for a relocation company, eh. She complained about how Labour had put housing projects in nice neighborhoods, forcing real English people to live side-by-side with animals. (Her words, not mine.) "You can get a good sense of a neighborhood by seeing who lives there," she said, driving me through Bethnal Green. "Look! Blacks!" she said, pointing.

My favorite bit, which I actually recorded with my new snazzy phone, was when she did an impersonation of someone who might shop at Banglatown (crazy accent and all!). I kindly suggested to her that perhaps if Englishwomen were doing their part to keep up the British birthrate, perhaps her country wouldn't have to rely so much on those dirty immigrants, like me.

She wailed, at one point, "Where have all the English people gone?" as we drove down the main thoroughfare of Whitechapel.

"There are loads of them in New York," I kindly suggested.

Later, when I had nearly reached the limit of what I could tolerate and Stephanie was complaining about how dirty Africans are, she admitted to me that her husband is a UK immigration judge. God help this country.

I'm still confused as to which way to look when crossing streets, and the added traffic of a major metropolitan city has me completely befuddled. I'm not yet familiar with the coins yet, so rather than holding up lines of people, I've been paying only with bills. After two days, already, I have a huge pile of useless change. I went to the store today to buy sugar and stood at the counter for a few minutes, desperately trying to figure out which coins to hand the woman behind counter. I was embarrassed and sweating, and finally the woman took pity on me and grabbing my hand, took the appropriate change out of it, and handed me the remains. Awkwardly I thanked her, trying to neutralize my accent, and trotted out the door.

Then yesterday, I decided to explore the cities Korean restaurants. My first stop (Korean Kitchen. 32 Windmill Street, Picadilly Circus, London, W1D 7LR) served me a bowl of soup with a hair in it. I showed the waitress, and she sent it back. I waited 10 minutes for another soup, and when it arrived, it had a black hair delicately balanced on top of a piece of tofu. Interestingly, I was not offered a free meal or anyone's firstborn, but they did suggest I wait for a third bowl of hairy soup. I left, and made my way to Jin Korean Restaurant, 16 Bateman Street London W1D 3A. As I was eating my lunch, a cockroach crawled out from the in-table bbq equipment and pranced across the table. He finally crawled back in, and I attempted to ignore the situation until a pair of antennae poked out and waggled at me, as if laughing. I put an upside-down plate over the hole, and mentally teleported to my safe space.

Last night I went to visit some friends in Whitechapel, in London's East End. When I left, I didn't take directions, confident that with the help of my A-Z I'd make it to the tube station. "It's Ay to ZED not Ay to ZEE, Lina. Yank."

Of course my ingrained sense of direction--my father calls me a topographical cretin--got me completely lost and as I wandered the streets of Whitechapel at midnight, I grew increasingly more terrified.

Lina stream of conciousness: I'm going to get mugged. That will be so humiliating. Wait, I know this street name. This is exactly where the serial killer Jack the Ripper stalked his prey! I'm going to get murdered here. Hang on, Jack the Ripper only killed prostitutes. I'm not a prostitute. I'm going to be fine. Oh shit. Everyone here thinks all Americans are whores. I'm so dead. I'm so dead. I'm so dead. Oh wait, there's the tube station. Yeah, I'm street smart. Phew.

So my first 48 hours left me feeling less cosmopolitan than I had hoped.

But then this morning, after having a crumpet and a cup of tea (seriously), I hit the streets and found a Chinese market, a Japanese market and a Korean market all within 7 minutes of my flat and I perked up. Even the local Spar (it's like 7-11) carries strange Asian snacks. After stuffing myself with a half-dozen Korean delicacies, I sat back, content with my new geographic position. I know that going to a couple of Asian markets and eating a little banchan doesn't sound like a big deal, but to me, it is. I'm so delighted to be back in a big city and to have access to all of the funny little things that one can't find anywhere else.

I love Real Genius

I love 'I'm a funky robot'

I love Hiberno-English

I love Intergalactic Gary

I love Child of Glass