The Beauty That Is Estate Housing (And Other London Attractions)
The walk back to our house can be a treacherous one. Basically, when you say you live in Acton people usually cringe and suck air between their teeth, and say things like ‘…really? Geez…’. We didn’t understand it at all. The people on the High Street are friendly, the shops are filled with legitimate-seeming salespeople. Then we discovered the blocks and blocks of estate housing a few streets back from the main area. Okay, they aren’t that dodgy, but let’s say that a woman should never walk alone there. And did I mention I was given a free personal alarm the other week ? The police were giving them away at the train station. When I got home (after walking through the projects) I showed it to Mike. He removed it from the pack and discovered that (four bleeding ears and a sore throat from yelling ‘make it stop!’ later) it definitely worked. And the building behind my work apparently used to be a drug den, and not so long ago no self-respecting citizen would have been caught dead setting foot on the dirty, narrow lane my work exists down. In fact, when I first got this job James and I were going to walk down and see where it was, but the alley was too dark and it smelled a little funny, so we decided to wait until day. It’s better now, but there are still a few people lurking in doorways that you can’t help but want to cross the road to avoid.
But back to the projects. These buildings are also the quickest way to get home from the main train station, so last night, busting to go to the loo, we decided to cut through there to get home (we usually try to take the road parallel to it to get home if it’s late; it’s better lit, and it’s terrace houses rather than towering blocks of houses with people’s washing hanging out the window. And plastic bags hanging out the windows too. To scare off the pigeons.). So we were trotting along at a pleasant pace when suddenly, out of nowhere, darted a fox! Yes, this whole blog has been leading up to me talking about seeing a fox. It was quick, but it confirmed that the animal that nibbled through our garbage bags the other night was indeed a fox! So we wandered into the park (probably foolish) trying to find it. Then we noticed a slightly gang-ish group of kids, so we quickly left.
I guess there are two points to this blog. First is that there are some kickass animals living in the city here. The hedgehogs are hibernating, but I’m sure we’ll see one soon (today is looking like Spring again, unlike the last few days of miserable wintriness). We just need to see a hedgehog and a badger and a puffin and an otter to complete our collection of wild animal sightings. The second point is that we have travelled all through Asia, through cities that are meant to be really dodgy, and I feel less safe in London. There’s just a sagging feeling here, where you feel like you have to constantly be on your toes. I know you should always be alert (not alarmed!). We sat in a park last night, before the comedy store, and suddenly felt aware of the fact that we should be holding our bags closely to our sides and making sure we didn’t get into areas too crowded. There’s this thing here called ‘Happy Slapping’ which is basically where gangs of youths beat the crap out of someone, and film it on their mobile phone cameras, to enjoy again later. And every day in the paper there’s a minimum of one murder/serial killer story. No, I’m not getting paranoid, but Britain is pretty damn dodgy. I just can’t believe that I travelled three continents, eight countries, and Britain is the only place I have felt remotely unsafe.
And on that cheerful note, James, Roger, Mike and I all went to Madam Tussaud’s on the weekend! It’s stupidly overpriced, but because we had a two-for-one deal we felt like it was good value. We paid two pounds extra to do *insert spooky voice here* Chamber Liiiiiive! Which was meant to be a serial killer exhibit. But it was lame and not creepy, and relied on big sounds and bright lights and people hissing stupidly in your face. Some people screamed, but we ended up laughing most of the way through. But then it is aimed for 12 year olds, so it can’t be too scary. The wax figures were as exciting as I remembered, but there were some really interesting people missing. For a start, Penelope Cruz was there(?!) but Nicole Kidman wasn’t. Colin Farrell was there, but Johnny Depp wasn’t! The funniest thing was Jennifer Aniston, though, who was standing awkwardly by Tom Cruise because she’d obviously been pushed five metres to the left to make room for Angelina Jolie to stand by Brad Pitt’s side! There was only one celebrity we didn’t know (she was shooting water into the pond with a water pistol, so if anyone has been to Madam Tussaud’s and knows who this was then please let us know!). All in all it was a fun day. I got to hug The Rock and Tom Jones, so I was happy a girl. And James got to shake his fist at Steven Spielberg (for ruining AI, amongst other issues), and knee John Howard in the crotch. And get his photo next to Fidel. So he, too, was a happy man.
Oh, and we saw ‘Hostel’ on Saturday night, which was lame. It left nothing to the imagination, and there was only one really gory scene. It was nowhere near as bad as I was expecting. ‘Wolf Creek’ was way better in that sense. And ‘Hostel’ had way too much pointless background, and ended really abruptly. And I read a review saying it was a ‘disgusting, stomach-churning’ film, which is just wasn’t. I mean, it was pointlessly gross at times, but it still didn’t turn my stomach as much as the cream bun scene in ‘Van Wilder: Party Liasion.’ Better luck next time, Eli Roth!