Went into London last night. This time I remembered the tube rules and avoided eye contact. I used to be fluent in tube rules but because I currently use pedal power more than LU. When you cycle in an urban environment eye contact is a survival technique, it helps you work out if the driver of a particular car has seen you or not. It is hard to switch off. However when I went to the last blogmeet I happened to make eye contact on the Piccadily Line only to find the chap then followed me onto the Central Line into a crowded carriage and decided to start a conversation "where are you going ?" "to meet my boyfriend for a dinner out" (statement accompanied with nice but dim smile and obvious flashing of engagement ring while my a voice in my head is scolding me for being a div, something along the lines of: why did you do it? you had a book, there was no excuse for even looking up...). Anyway I decided not to make the same mistake again and this time my eyes stayed firmly on The Amateur Marriage (Anne Tyler). I kept my ears opened for announcements worth hearing and the driver on the Central line did not disappoint "if you are travelling on this line you are in for a rough night, I'll tell you all about it in a minute", unfortunately I alighted at St Paul's so did not get to hear all about itthough I gather it was to do with fires and fire alerts, no stopping at stations and rail replacement bus services. The evening was nice and I laughed more in 4 hours than I had for the previous 2 weeks put together (note to self : I need to go out more often, maybe even go to a gig - if anybody out there has any ideas feel free to suggest). I am not sure if I am still bared from posting pictures of the meet, after all Tom did not renew his threat of hunting me down and using my bones as etc, etc, etc. Still I'll play it safe. Return journey was nice too, the first Piccadilly train was a Heathrow train so no waiting or changing and I did not pick a bad carriage for people spotting (without eye contact obviously). There was the usual drunk staring at a can of Tennants and then dropping it so it filled the pink rucksack of the weird lady in an emerald woolly hat who was sat accross him. I don't know if she noticed or cared. There was something peculiar in the way she stared blankly at the window while her finger ran accross the lines of a library book, always the same page. There was a couple of American tourists and an Australian surfer who insisted on breaking the don't talk to people tube rule. They were commenting on his wife's dislike of London and the unfriendliness of people on the tube. They spotted a victim and having decided she looked American (she was and American studying English) decided she should join their conversation and they she had to face a non stop barrage of questions. After a while they decided they should ask me why I thought people did not speak to strangers on the tube. Thankfully I had reached my stop as I could not decide if I should: a) pretend I did not understand the question (there is always the danger they will attempt to carry own the conversation in broken French but it can be a risk worth taking). b) ignore the question c) tell them it was because if they had had a horrible day the last thing they wanted was for a tourist to tell them how much they disliked London while they are trying to work out if their dinner will still be warmby he time they get home and if they had a nice time they don't want a tourist ruining it by going on about how much they hate London and it is not at all like they expected and how people are so unfriendly. Excellent timing allowed me to use my joker "this is my stop, have a good evening". Londoners are not unfriendly... the proof, when I got to the bus station the driver was on a break, having a cigarette and a chat with another driver, when he spotted me, he came back and said "here love, you're on your own, you'd better go and sit inside" and let me in and closed he door before going back to his cigarette. That's a gentleman for you.
22.10.04 00:21
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Karen / Website (22.10.04 12:04) How is The Amateur Marriage? I wasn't sure whether I wanted to read it or not. |
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(22.10.04 12:51) can't seem to really get into it so far. It's a good choice for the tube as it's so good that you are likely to miss your stop. It might improve after a few chapters, much prefered "back when we were grown ups". |
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(22.10.04 15:16) Sounds like your an expert on the tube! I used to get the national express a lot, and you could guarantee that everytime I would end up sat for 4 or more hours next to either a drunk who wanted to warn me off alcoholism while trying to give me vodka, or old ladies who liked to gas... |
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Lisa / Website (22.10.04 16:39) It always takes me aback when I go to the States and people strike up conversations with me. It doesn't happen often in Montreal (must be that French thing), but you get it once in a while in Toronto too. In a way, it's kind of nice that people are friendly to each other and exchange a bit of small talk...but then I find it really annoying when I'm not in the mood for it. I must be becoming more English. 
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