London Not Calling

Maybe I've just been unlucky. Maybe I haven't seen the best of the city. Maybe, though, there's a reason that movies like Children of Men and 28 Days have been set there.

London has that gloomy, post-apocalyptic feel that envelops you as soon as you enter the half-outside, half-inside automated netherworld that is the shuttle taking you from Gatwick's North terminal to its South terminal. It was there again as I spent arrived for a writing course last week.

Stepping into the Underground (an ominous name itself), you hear cool, clinical automated voices telling you to "Mind the Gap" ad nauseum, and buses have those creepy security screens in full view of all passengers that seem to presage a mugging. Work being done on the rails or the odd strike is also a very common occurence, so your travels can get bogged down in a hurry.

The city EATS money as well, in the manner of shoebox-sized hotel rooms for 120 pounds/night, shuttles (the Gatwick Express expressly makes your wallet lighter for 17 pounds for a one-way train ticket into the city), and an added 17 pounds for 24 hrs of wireless access at the hotel.

Yes, it has its charms - a huge selection of great restaurants and takeaway spots, mostly very friendly people, a royal family to easily make fun of, and neighborhoods like Notting Hill.

But you can feel the unspoken class warfare as well, and the gulf between the 'avs and the 'avnots is easily visible in the form of numerous private clubs, high-end cars, and the barely concealed contempt in so many hotel staffers' eyes.

Perhaps, as I say, I have just been unlucky on my four visits there, with a total of 3 hours of sunshine. Maybe I need a better spot to stay and more insider knowledge. Or buckets of money. Or, maybe Clive Owen and all those zombies were angry for a reason.

On the Move

Greetings from Henley-on-Thames, an impossibly quaint town - a hamlet, if you will - on the river outside of London that has existed since the 12th century.

Pubs, hobby shops, small restaurants, rain, and good manners. I half expect the Bard himself to stroll by, or at the very least a distraught Elizabeth Hurley in need of consolation after another disastrous break-up.

Alas, it's back to my Guinness, my imagination and then maybe some apple crumble.

EROTICA

Ok, so here are the first ever European Rankings of Odd Things of Interest to a Childish Adult. So if your partner or co-worker asks what you’re doing, you can make it sound more exciting by saying you are reading erotica.

As you read it, some things will quickly become obvious:

A - it only includes 5 countries (so far)

B - even within these countries, it only includes a few major cities

C - even within these cities, it may only include observations based on brief visits

So overall, it is based on sketchy, highly dubious research usually involving massive generalizations, and it has always been conducted by only one person’s eyes, ears and tastes. And for good measure, the categories sometimes mix cities and countries.

Good - now that that’s clear, enjoy! Feel free to add your comments and questions below as well.

Best Hair

As far as the females are concerned:

1. Paris
2. 4-way tie between London, Spain, Amsterdam, and Berlin

As for the guys, I haven’t really noticed other than to say that Holland’s men are in last place by a fair margin. The “wet look” thrives in Amsterdam and the other Dutch cities, with curly jheri-curled mops sitting like roadkill atop most men’s heads. Those that have moved on from this only got so far as the late 80’s/early 90’s, with Andrew McCarthy or Chandler Bing as role models. One suspects this scene occurring daily in barbershops and salons across the country: “What it’ll be today, Hans?” “Hmm, just give me The Douche, thanks”

Best Kids

1. Spain
2. France
3. Berlin
4. Amsterdam

Maybe it’s a function of age and that I am hoping to have some of my own, but I have noticed a lot of kids in each city I’ve visited. Spain wins here, with France a very close second. Coolly dressed, happy, and well-mannered but not Stepford children, the little Spaniards and Francais are awesome. Amsterdam’s braying monsters, however, are in last place by a long shot. There’s even a popular ad for birth control on Dutch TV featuring a kid throwing a tantrum in a supermarket. They could have saved money by simply encouraging people to leave their homes daily and observe. There’s an entire cultural mindset and philosophy behind the unrestrained child that has some arguable merit, but I will leave that for another day.

You’ll notice London absent from this list. I didn’t see anyone under the age of 18 there. I think they ship all their kids off to the countryside for boarding school so they can enjoy all the great restaurants and shops in peace.

Best Cafes/Bars

1. Amsterdam
2. Berlin
3. London
4. Paris
5. Spain

Amsterdam wins by a long shot - cozy and cool, with a choice of stylish modern or quaint old-school. Especially when lit up at night with candles in most windows, the whole city looks inviting. Spain is in last place, with lights so bright you feel like you are being X-rayed as beer and tapas passes through your system. I imagine this is done to simulate daylight so people can manage going for dinner at 10pm and to bars at 1am.

Service

1. London
2. Tie between Spain, Amsterdam, and Berlin
3. Paris

London’s bars and restaurants are great and obviously have borrowed a page from the old British politeness of old. And their cabs are far and away the best (and most trustworthy) of all the other cities combined.

As for the legendary poor service of Amsterdam, it’s a bit tricky. When it’s bad, yes, it’s truly awful as you occasionally question why on earth someone has chosen a job to serve nourishment to others when they clearly hate humans. But it’s a bit of a bad rap too, as there is more than often excellent, friendly, and casual (with exceptional English and even the occasional free cheesecake) service in many places in Amsterdam as well. It’s a case of a few rotten apples spoiling the bunch. As for Paris bringing up the rear, it is also not nearly as bad as the word on the street will have you believe, but it does lag behind the others.

Directions

Asking for directions on the street or in the metro?

1. Spain and Berlin and Amsterdam
2. London
3. Paris

I’ve had Spanish families tell me which way to go, then run after me to correct me as I appear to not be heading the right way. Women buzzing up to their apartments to inquire with their roommates to locate a bar. Berlin is right up there too, with directions turning into a casual conversation, and Amsterdam is more than accustomed to tourists and handles everyone really well.

London is fine, I suppose, but people initially have that flash of “Is he going to mug me or make me a Hare Krishna” look in their eyes and are thus a little wary. Parisians only tell you how to get to the next corner with a “thattaway” expression of pointing and saying “tout droit.” Its always tout droit (straight ahead). Which is fine - you just need to ask another Parisian when you arrive at said corner. To avoid bugging locals, Paris has smartly added maps of the city to every street entrance to the metro, which the other cities should adopt right away.

Affordability

1. Malaga
2. Berlin
3. Barcelona
4. Amsterdam
5. London
6. Paris

This refers mainly to getting a beer or a meal, and not so much on accommodation (if so, London would be at the bottom) nor heroin. Malaga, with its 1.70 Euros for a bottle of beer, 4 Euros for a sandwich, juice and fantastic coffee on the beach, and 2 Euro tapas dishes wins hands down. Amsterdam and London take some digging but both have their share of cheap eats too.

Web Access

(Somewhat sadly) as crucial as it is to everyday life now, this is an important category for everything to apartment-hunting to transit maps and schedules to social gatherings.

1. Tie - Berlin and Amsterdam
2. London
3. Paris and Spain
4. Spain

Cafes abound in Berlin and Amsterdam where you can hop on the Net with your laptop for the price of a cup of coffee. London is solid as well. Paris doesn’t have this culture just yet, as sitting in a cafe is bit more refined and you are better off with a copy of Le Monde and the eye candy parading before you. Spain isn’t too bad, and once you find a spot you can sit unmolested for hours (I recommend doing just that overlooking the ocean in Malaga at a place called Pedrega), but Barcelona didn’t have the ubiquity of places that the others do.

Getting Around

1. Amsterdam and Paris
2. Tie - London, Berlin, Spain

If you have a bike in Amsterdam, you rule the world. Special bike lanes are everywhere, right-of-way is a god-given gift to cyclists, and there’s always somewhere to park your ride. (Whether or not it’s still there when you get back is another story). And when it rains too hard, simply lock it up wherever you are and hop on a tram or bus. Paris’ smart metro system is so regular that it’s sponsored by Metamucil, and you can just as easily walk everywhere and encounter culture or a public green space at every corner. As for the others, it’s a measure of any good transit system that you can figure it out within minutes of hopping on the first metro, and they all accomplish this.

London’s Tube is a cracker, except for the frequent interruptions for contruction or jumpers. And they lose points simply because I very nearly got barfed on a few months’ back.

Irony

It's fairly ironic that the worst part of travel is, well, travel.

While it may sound glamourous to say I'm heading to Paris, London, Barcelona, Zurich, Prague all in the months of December and January....well ok, it is a bit better than Red Deer, Lacombe, and Edmonton, I'll grant you that . But the act of getting to each place is a little less enviable.

Where to begin? On the Eurostar from Paris to London, on a train made only for those under 5'6", I'm seated directly facing the world's most affectionate couple. I'm not sure what the Chinese word for Schmoopie is, but I'm pretty sure they said it every few seconds. I'm also not sure what happens when one of them has to go the bathroom, but it must be devastating. I don't think they did, actually. But after watching them, I sure had to.

Glamour also wears off quickly in places like the Paris Metro, when you're being packed like Twinkies into Oprah's mouth, and having someone cough directly into your cornea. Or on the famed London Underground, where at 8:45am on the 9-hour day back home (see newspaper headlines above), a 30-something guy, without sound or warning, expels the most massive amount of vomit since Britney Spears' last album. Had I been standing a foot closer, I would have been wearing it the rest of the day.

So next time someone tells you, whether they're bragging or just plainly recounting, that he/she is jet-setting around various overseas locales, take heart that you may actually be enjoying a much more pleasant ride while couch-surfing at home.

London Calling

A pre-Christmas Paris-London trip wraps up - and it was possibly the least glamourous one possible, given the very unusual snowfalls in both cities and the holiday travel crunch.

I will expand on what made this trip particularly unsexy in a post later this week. For now, here are some nice images from a sunny Sunday morning in Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens...