London-centric mentalism

[Walsingham]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics...-at-550000.html

 

As many will have noticed, I f***ing hate London. I hate the pollution. I hate the miserable bastards who live there. I hate the way they spend all day doing nothing but being even more miserable and miserifying each other. I especially hate the insistence that it's full of culture when no-one ever seems to use any of it. But more than anything I hate the house prices.

 

The house in the above link is 66 inches wide, and going for

[Monte Carlo]

From the top of my London townhouse, and with a very powerful telescope, I can just about espy the provinces. I hear that, now and then, they can be quite a reasonable place to visit.

 

London is a city-state. You're not meant to like it, just benefit from the wealth it generates. London has more in common with Hong Kong or 16th Century Venice than it does with provincial England.

[Blarghagh]

I've never been to London, but everyone I know whose ever been there has urged me not to follow in their footsteps, and that's quite a lot of people.

[Pidesco]

The future is coming.

 

The Sliced-Crosswise Only-on-Tuesday World

 

Billenium

[Monte Carlo]

^ I could say exactly the same about Amsterdam, fabled home of nothing but cannabis dens and hookers.

 

Of course, that's rubbish. there's a lot more to the place than that because I'm a belligerent SOB and don't believe that any major European city isn't worth visiting.

 

A trip to any large metropolis requires meticulous planning. It rewards the diligent and punishes the lazy - and I don't care if you're talking about Paris or Berlin or even Rome. I'm a New York City veteran and I've got the scars on my back from not planning that one properly (I've mastered it now). Berlin can be an unforgiving bitch of a place to visit if you don't know what you're doing and don't plan. If you do it's incredible, one of my favourite cities. London is very similar.

 

Parts of London are horrible and worth avoiding: other parts are sublime. This is what makes it what it is.

 

Cheers

MC

[Hurlshort]

Can you even get a decent sized bed into that house? It's actually bigger than my condo (which we overpaid $355,000 for) but the space must be an utter hassle to work with.

[Meshugger]

I've been to London three times in my life: In 1991, 1999 and in 2003. Every single time I've had a hard time to meet a "real" londoner (i actually ventured as far as Hammersmith!), everyone seems to be from somewhere else than London itself. And you guys are living very packed as it is, sheesh!

 

Bear in mind, i've been to New York as well and they do not live nearly as crowded as you guys.

[Monte Carlo]

^ Yes, a common denominator of world cities is that hardly anyone living there is from there.

 

I am an exception, I was born in London and have lived here all of my life, bar three years as a teenager in the early 80's and another three at University.

[Monte Carlo]

I'm glad somebody referenced Ballard earlier, his dystopias capture what post-modern cities are perfectly.

 

The major city is as much a part of the built environment as a mountain is part of the natural... the only people who have seen cities as 'machines for living' have historically been socialists and other authoritarians. The true nature of the city is more like the corporate bordello described by Ballard, it applies as much to Babylon or ancient Rome.

 

What I'm saying is that you view a city as you would a challenging natural part of the environment. If I were a Masai warrior the bush would be an easy place to live. If I were a Sherpa the mountains are my backyard. I, OTOH, am a Londoner, a finely honed survivor of an equally challenging (albeit urban) terrain

 

Now, as I approach my dotage and look to my son, I ponder moving out to the Elephant's Graveyard of the counties. A well-trodden path that I will walk without too much regret, but having lived all of my twenties and thirties now my early forties in London it's been an incredible experience.

 

Cheers

MC

[Aram]

I recently moved into a four bedroom house with a barn on 40 acres for less than a third of that.

 

From the little I've experienced in my few trips out to that country, I think that even what is considered a very large and spacious house there would be considered by most small and claustrophobic here.

[J.E. Sawyer]

I don't think much can compare to London housing prices. Even 2005's California housing prices were (IIRC) nowhere near London's. Still, they drove me to buy a nice almost-100-year-old two-story brick house in rural Wisconsin. Madison's probably as urban as I'll never need to be; I'm a countryside person at heart.

[Killian Kalthorne]

How can anyone live like that? I most certainly couldn't. Maybe it can be a gag gift for a claustrophobic.

[Blarghagh]

^ I could say exactly the same about Amsterdam, fabled home of nothing but cannabis dens and hookers.

 

Well, here's one person who worked there for half a year saying that it's not nearly that bad. While there is plenty of cannabis, it's concentrated in little shops, and I didn't see any hookers in half a year.

[Monte Carlo]

Why don't you go back and read my post again?

[Walsingham]

But people in London are so goddamn unfriendly. I held the door for someone once and they looked at me as if I'd farted.

[Blarghagh]

Why don't you go back and read my post again?

 

Sorry, I must misunderstand it. Can you rephrase please?

 

 

tl;dr version me english no good sry.

[Monte Carlo]

^ Sorry, forgot English was your second language. My point was that of course the stereotype about Amsterdam was stupid.

 

That was my point. The same principle applies to London.

 

@ Walsingham.

 

London is no different from Tokyo or New York. A gazillion people from myriad cultures, most of whom focussed on making a living, in a confined physical space.

 

Niceness is not part of the deal. Not perfect, but completely understandable. Where London is different is that it is a city of villages. As soon as you get out of the Zone One hub (i.e. the London version of Manhattan Island) it becomes rather different.

[Humodour]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics...-at-550000.html

 

As many will have noticed, I f***ing hate London. I hate the pollution. I hate the miserable bastards who live there. I hate the way they spend all day doing nothing but being even more miserable and miserifying each other. I especially hate the insistence that it's full of culture when no-one ever seems to use any of it. But more than anything I hate the house prices.

 

The house in the above link is 66 inches wide, and going for

Edited December 7, 2009 by Krezack

[Monte Carlo]

And oranges contain citrus, apples don't. Fascinating.

[Lare Kikkeli]

I'm moving to a 180 ft

[Humodour]

And oranges contain citrus, apples don't. Fascinating.

 

Australians contain teeth and the British don't. This is also fascinating.

[Moose]

So what you're saying is that wit is inversely proportional to the amount of teeth someone has? Interesting.

[Walsingham]

London is no different from Tokyo or New York. A gazillion people from myriad cultures, most of whom focussed on making a living, in a confined physical space.

 

Niceness is not part of the deal. Not perfect, but completely understandable. Where London is different is that it is a city of villages. As soon as you get out of the Zone One hub (i.e. the London version of Manhattan Island) it becomes rather different.

 

 

But London is also very expensive. People move there to make a living, but then seem incapable of enjoying that living whilst they are making it, because they spend all the income on ridiculous mortgages and taxi fares.

 

The reason I'm actually vexed by all this is that London acts like a gravity well, hoovering up people from the regions. This places an unenduarble strain on public services in London, and saps the rest of the country of workers and investment. Hopefully things like moving part of the BBC to Manchester will help shift media attention outside zone 1.

[Monte Carlo]

^ World Cities do that, they draw people to them. Just view London as a necessary evil, it's easy to ignore. I know I did when I lived outside it.

 

And moving the BBC to Manchester was the worst sort of pork-barrel politiking by Zanu NuLabour, a complete waste of our tax pounds. Did you see the re-location packages? Unbelievable, meanwhile the armed forces want for helicopters, but the BBC sports department is lavishly funded to move to a comfy Labour safe seat. It's like ploughing the earth and salting the fields by this government, who know they're going to be out of office in six months.

[Lare Kikkeli]

Wait, you actually think helicopters are more important than the BBC?