More listening to London

Categories: uncategorized, buildings-and-cities

Tags: foundspeech, london, politics, buses

Date: 12 June 2009 10:46:39

Seen from a bus:
There were police in the act of arresting someone at the bus-stop in front of Lewisham Station this morning. Or at least it looked as if they were from where I was sitting on the 321, they had the back of their van open and it looked as if they were bundling someone in. Of course I don't know for sure if it was an arrest. Maybe they had just stopped for a cup of tea and a chat, but if they had it was a funny place and time to do it. The bus stopped right next to them and we passengers all got off the bus and went up to catch our trains. I think there are cities in the world where a bus driver would not stop at an arrest scene however many passengers wanted to get off. I think there are cities in the world where the passengers would insist loudly that the bus drove on as quickly as possible. OK this was the BTP, and if they had arrested someone it was as probably for getting on the DLR without a ticket. But you cant tell that from the other side of the road. Two vans and half a dozen uniformed police, and at least one plain-clothes (I assume since she opened the door of a police van herself and got into the front) Anything could be happening. But the bus stopped and we walked right past them. No-one here expects the police, or those they are chasing, to have guns. So no-one is scared to be near them.
Overheard on a bus:
29 bus last night, packed with standers, only two empty seats . Young women walks up to them, turns round without sitting down, comes back again. I take my chance and sit down and find myself next to the reason she didn't. Dirty, drunk, bad-smelling tall twenty-something man, feet on the seat opposite, talking to himself or his can of K cider. Or maybe talking to me. Mumbling as if I wasn't meant to hear. "That's right. You sit next to me, Get your fat arse into the seat" Northern Irish accent I think, the sort that sounds almost Glasgow. Then off on a mumbling rant about the state of the world and the nation. "Twenty-two pounds a week Army pension. Its a joke." It seems that he has an unfeasibly large number of stitches and no job. And the fat cats screw you whatever you do. Then he sat up straight, seemed to take notice of his surroundings, and asked my how my day had been, before apologising to the women opposite and getting off the bus. Though he turned round on the pavement and made a throat-chopping gesture at someone. I hope it wasn't meant for me.
The song remains the same:
Tube strike has caused a flurry of political conversation around the office. Best line so far: Ms. X [defending the strikers]: "Maybe they should get 5%. Why shouldn't workers get the same money as their bosses?" Mr Y [horrified]: "But.. but.. that's Communist!" X: "Well, I am a Communist" People are actually talking about politics, the fash are getting pelted in the streets, a Labour government is groping its way to ignominious defeat, there is a Tube strike, its raining, and I'm listening to Deep Purple... Bloody hell, its the 1970s!
But fings ain't wot they used to be:
Overheard in a pub: "... eighteen of them and they were all Romanians and they were all pregnant. And the Lewisham Council gave them every floor of a whole block of flats, the whole building just for them. AND their partners. No English people could get that. We have to work for everything we get in this country... [blah-blah]...politically-correct...[ [blah-blah] ...soft...[blah-blah]...that's the trouble with this country...[blah-blah]...so liberal...[blah-blah]...the Englishman is a foreigner in his own country...[blah-blah]...politically-correct..." Nothing remarkable about that, you can hear similar nonsense any day if you hang around in the wrong bars. Except that the young black man who said it was wearing a hoodie, combats, and a baseball cap. London truly is a multicultural society :)