hm. not sure why i'm so overcome with emoji right about now.
at first it was all glorious...
i remember the first day i arrived in london april 22nd, 2013. i
was walkin around and it was the first sunny spring day in london. 11 degrees
centipede (that's 4 stone and 12 quid for all you uncultured americans) and i
looked around in astonishment as everyone was walkin around practically nekkid. hm- i had no
doubts that i was going to thoroughly relish this
town. i would love to go for a run (ok, i would hate to go for a run but
it turned out to be a beautiful method to explore the new frontier) i would run
in a new direction for 15 minutes and get lost in the dickensian, cobbled,
london passageways thinking i could find my way back to shoreditch by just
following the thames. 6 hours later i would return home on a night bus
that could have got me home earlier had i taken it in the right direction.
i marveled at
the architecture and buildings- for an american whose country is not even 250
years old, running into 11th century monuments
like the tower of london less than a mile from my crib is as unbelievable as
seeing a pterodactyl traversing the wild blue yonder. mythical shit. st. paul's
cathedral, royal courts of justice, just to name of they few epic structures i
was fortunate enough to pass on my daily commute. random meanderings and
closer inspection, i came across into gems like woven wooden structures inspired by chaucer and a florence nightengale
statue whom until i read the plaque i thought was the tooth fairy. i would go into
an "oriental restaurant" and discuss with the waiter why he shouldn't
use the word oriental to describe himself. he looked at me bewildered as
he handed me the menu which bore the name "Kung Food" i
surrendered and ordered the "authentic sichuan curry chips"..
overwhelmed with the novelty and
the excitement that comes with it, life couldn't have been more beautiful and
full of enthooze..
then something happened about two months in. the whole time, i was
also looking forward to seeing this girl i fell for a week before leaving NYC.
she came about to visit and although still special, it was completely
different than what i had thought it was going to be. we ended up not
sleeping together and it had a strange affect on me which may have marked the beginning of the realization that i was not a tourist- that i had flown the coop fer reals. she left and with her,
my last tether to new york was gone and reality had set in. coming from
new york, where i have at least 100 friends that i can hang out with on any
given night. a city that i felt loved me as much as i loved it. i
now had no one...
one of my biggest fears in life is being completely alone. i mean
i love living by myself, and i am usually at my happiest when not in a
relationship- but i need my friends, homies, family. i even think i've
padded myself from this fear because all my life, i've collected people.
more and more and more friends everywhere to ensure i'd never be alone.
and now here i was, more alone than ever. and at fucking 40.
not the easiest age to start over and make friends all over town. especially in a city where i don't drink and the whole social culture revolves around pubs. if not that, then the people i would meet out on the music/dance scene taking ketamine til 7am onna toozedee.
it was one of the most difficult transitions of my life...
becoming- well, a loser in london. i never really thought i
was good at anything in life except being good with people. and i actually
praised myself for that for, i thought of all the different forms of
intelligence and wisdom- i thought that the navigation of human relation is one
of the highest and most relevant in the day to day. but this theory lie
in stubborn opposition to what i was experiencing for months in london.
i tried to go out to parties alone to meet people. i would go out
to clubs alone, and the bouncer always teased "no friends?".
their inside... "sure they are buddy" was i just
getting dissed by some pimply 23 year old going to a warehouse party? i
did meet some wonderful souls- they just never matured into a level of
homie-ness that i longed for. friday nights soon turned into watching
"east enders" whilst clipping my toenails and manicuring my dead
jasmine tree that i never watered. except for my roommate. my
godsend co-worker roommate, friend, and sister whom i owe my sanity to for being
the type of person to stay home every night and watch the same episode of
family guy to keep me company. also thank you pineapple- 5 classes
a week. 5 hours of guaranteed happiness, escape, and solace every week to
look forward too. thank you work- for being the most beautiful people in
london and making some of the working days some of the best days of my entire
stay
a year went by and my visa was up and i couldn't wait to get back to new
york. i remember it exactly when i was booking my ticket and then i felt
a rumbling deep inside my gut and i knew it wasn't just the saag paneer i
had consumed from the best chef of brick lane 2008 restaurant. i knew
there was something special about this city- there had to be. so
many of my freak heroes come from this small concentrated island- jagger,
bowie, shaun ryder, aldous huxley, peter sellers, vivienne westwood, alexander
mcqueen. deciding to follow my heart and not listen to my head, i decided
right then and there to stay. i learned that when going down a path and
you reach a fork- your head knows to go one way but your heart tells you to go
the other- most of the time if you follow your head you will make it safely to
the comfort of your nest and all will be good as you know it and have always known it. if you follow your heart, you will run the risk
of running into some thorny shrubs or a patch of poison oak. however!
there is that small chance that you will run into an isolated waterfall
gloriously cascading into crystal pools of elation with naked nymphs that have
like three boobs or some shit showering you with adulation on your hair and
abs.
the point is- you can deal with some thorns in your underwear every now
and then for a brief glimpse of paradise.
and so i stayed and things started to turn the corner. i decided
to look at london with a different set of eyes, and that's prolly all it
was all along. i finally met a homie who actually made repeated
efforts to keep in contact with me and whom i absolutely cherished as well. he
left a few months later, but his push gave me the confidence to swim out from
the shore a little further than what i thought was previously safe. i
stand eternally grateful for this and will love him forever. as i
explored east london further, i could feel myself start to fall in love.
i embraced dirty ass dalston, the filthy wick, getting up to no good in
gillet square, cracking nitrous in allen gardens at 5am. even that hot mess of the essex immigrants to
sloppy shoreditch on a saturday became endearing to me. then outwards
and onwards from boogeying in brixton to traipsing in the wild bawdy heath. i sojourned the world
class museums such as my now all time favorite the V&A museum where upon
entering to the right in the sculpture hall, you are greeted by an epic statue
of samson about to strike down a fatal blow to his opponenet. stepping out of south ken and up and over to hyde park where i would smell the fragrant meticulously manicured gardens in hyde park, then back to the east where
the best open air gallery of street are the world is displayed all over my doorstep.
and the sunshine days. the not-as-rare-as-one-would-think days of
sunshine splashed across the city which draws all its denizens to burst
outside covered in stingy amounts of fabric and celebrate life itself.
these days are treated as absolute treasures and are never taken for granted
as the british mayans pay their respects to the sun god. indeed my
favorite memories of london will be in these outstretched days of summer when
dusk falls a little later than the rest of the universe and embraces the city
in a contemplative light, and the people retreat to the
green spaces that carpet the city. the glow sets a unifying temperament
across the masses as they laugh and dance in camaraderie, taking in their
last sips of a bottle or a balloon depending on what park you are in.
but of course in the end what makes a city great is always the people.
and once i got past the stodgy imagery endowed upon the brits -built up
in my own judgmental mind - they are some of the most beautiful freaks around.
new york will have my head, but in terms of edginess, east london is
second to none. their colors, their hair, their kicks, blended with a history
of impeccable tailoring. royal grace is worn proudly as a badge of
eccentricity. as glorified in the ghettos as it is with the fashion elite
in the genius darlings of mcqueen and westwood- it is an expression of
individuality i haven't seen since the glory days of my youth in san francisco.
it was absolutely magical to see it exist again right on my doorstep.
and lastly i fucking fell in love... madly. with someone i
never would have considered dating in the first place had i lived forever in
the shallow perception of what i thought love is in new york. with
someone who was originally supposed to start out as a london tryst. and
now i'm leaving this country still in love with her. as an aged, jaded
romantic- i still find it remarkable that whilst in love, maybe the most
special i've felt in all my life- i am leaving it to come home. never in
my life would i think i would walk away from it and yet here i go. and
i'm scared shitless i might lose it forever.
and now london- as you sing to me like a siren, softly crooning for my
continued stay, i gotsta git awn home. home to the city that has
shown me as much love as much as i it.
but i thank you so much, london. i have never been this humbled
and humiliated, or gained this much perspective, since i flew from the safety
of my family’s nest. you have shown and taught me so much about life that
my soul will be connected to you forever, and I am beyond grateful to have
called this place home for a part of my life. and most importantly
to all you axiomites around the globe i met along the way- you've no idea
what a lifeline you were to this korean monkey that may saunter around with a
flair of confidence and surefootedness, but deep inside is scared of
everything. forever lost and just bumbling about as best he can, thank
you for holding my hand and helping me stumble along this crazy rocky path
called life and above all validating that one should follow their hearts.
one last story i'll share. if you are a citizen of the law, i am
making this up- but my last day in london, i had a triumphant romp in the heath
on acid and it was absolutely beautiful. i walked back enveloped in a
general warm embrace that london was giving me on my final night. i did
wanna ciggy tho. it was dark along regents canal and i saw some dood
smoking. i fished out a pound and walked up to him, and upon getting
closer- i realized he was some homeless dood. anyways he was smoking and
i asked if i could buy a cigarette off him. he was like, "i just get off
the streets- i wish i could give you sumfin, but you could smoke a bit of this
joint i scrambled together" i called over gnocchi and introduced her to
him, and then i introduced myself and shook his clammy, dirty hands firmly and
i gave him the pound and we all enjoyed some tokes and enjoyed each others
company. when i departed, i took out some piece of paper from my wallet
and told him that life has put me in a more fortunate situation for right now
so here's this. i had no idea what denomination it was because my ass was
still tripping ballz, but i sincerely hope it was a twenny or some shit.
i walked down the path for about 15minutes contemplating how any of us
could be put in that position at any time and i wonder when the last time
he had a conversation with anyone- as he was extremely grateful for just giving him some time. then we
hear a hootin and hollerin from behind and we're bolth all spaced and
thinkin that we were paranoid that someone might be chasin us... indeed we turned
around and he chased us all the way down to give us the remainder of his joint.
we embraced and i told him thank you and i love you and i wished him the
best of luck in life.
it was the most beautiful human interaction that happened to me in a
lawnnnggg ass time.
thank you london.
poo!
