What It’s Like Spending Christmas in London For The First Time.
There comes a time when your expectation will not match the reality, moments like this help us draw out a higher life experience from such trips. My expectation for London and the reality after landing, different.
London is a beautiful city, the significance of this moment is huge for me.
A real confirmation that children’s dream come through. This was the one place I’ve always wanted to come to as a child but could only dream. Here. London. I’m glad I made it here.
The most common impressions people have about London remain true.
The architecture is futuristic while being olden. It’s common to see oddly shaped apartment buildings that look like something you’d only draw on paper.
Interaction here is easy.
Some people can chatter your ear off trying to help you as they can clearly tell you are a tourist. In fact one lady looked at me and said “American?” first word out her mouth. I felt. . .I didn’t how to feel, if it was a good thing I stood out by hopefully the only good thing American travelers are known for, if any. Or, if it was a confirmation of everything many uncultured American travelers do overseas. We’ll never know.
As to starting a conversation or asking for help, Londoners would be nice enough to give you directions but it doesn’t seem very easy to make friends for the night, and that may be due to the season. Party buddies to bar hop is always a good thing.
The women are good looking. A lot of them seem like they’re from somewhere else. The ones that are “ancestral English” and white seem quite pale — almost like they have no blood, like you’re about to see their skeleton if you stared hard enough. There’s a good amount of Asian people.
Not as many Black people. Many European looking folks. I haven’t seen a Latina — yet, bummer in capital letters. No bueno. Momento mami.
There are spots of interracial couples, black male/white female, black female/white male, black male/asian female. Reminds me of Seattle. Similar weather too but I don’t think Londoners know what “happy lights” mean.
They seem highly influenced by New York. There are in fact billboards reminding people to go experience New York.
A good amount of the men seem slim compared to Americans. They aren’t fat, they aren’t bulky. They are more like soccer players.
A lot of people keep to themselves. No “Bonjour” to everyone you share space with, no “southern hospitality”, no smiling to people coming your way either. You know how Americans say “hey” to get a person’s attention, yeah, I said hey quite a lot but the register folks thought I was rehearsing a new word I just learned. So maybe “hello” is more their thing?
If you’ve been to America, Londoners drive on the “opposite” side of the road. So, if American left side of the road is the “going to work” traffic, in London that would be the “coming home” traffic. The right side of the road here is the oncoming traffic while in America the right side of the road is the meeting traffic — traffic traveling in the same direction as you.
Not only are the lanes different, the steering wheel different, the traffic expectations for cars too seem different from America. I did not see a stop sign in a street intersection for cars.
I expected an oncoming car on the corner street to stop before either making a right or left into the express way but that wasn’t the case. I was trying to not get locked up abroad but instead I almost got ran over abroad.
The driver didn’t bother to stop even if he saw me crossing the street. To my surprise, while singing “we’re not in Kansas anymore”, I looked over the road and there was no stop sign to motivate him. This can be a good thing.
Writing this now, I have flash backs to those miserable times I sat in my car in America watching one somebody take their sweet ol’ time as they cross the road, walking as slow as possible.
In America, pedestrians have right of way — meaning a car has to stop if you’re crossing the road, might be different in London. Also, jaywalking didn’t seem like a big deal in London like say some parts of Canada where you could pay a pretty penny for a jaywalking fine.
For 24th December, I searched and searched but unfortunately I couldn’t find anything to do on Christmas eve, well anything I’d want to do. The reoccurring recommendations were to go ice skating, go to the cinemas and all that, I was more interested in where to go dance, drink a bit and exchange saliva with a feminine warm body.
I still do not believe there’s absolutely nothing going on in London for the 24th, but I think they did a rubbish job promoting it. I picked up a new slang by the way, “Rubbish”, it sounds so adult.
There doesn’t seem to be much going on for Christmas. The streets are not decorated, the stores are not covered with “Merry Christmas” in bold letters, the store reps barely remember to wish you “Happy Holidays”, it seem quite like an every day, day.
I walked some, get to know the neighborhood and behavior of locals. The bars can barely account for more than two people at each one. This is on Old City rd part of town.
I recommend the Z place, barely over forty pounds a night, far from airport, close to train stations, many bus stops around, convenience stores. The staff also quite top notch. They don’t give happy endings though if you were wondering but they seem like good people. They offer free wine in the evening, drink to your heart’s content.
Prior to choosing this destination, while researching London as a Christmas vacation spot, I did read that the whole place shuts down for Christmas and 26th. Truth be told I did not necessarily believe a city this popular would be completely shut down, well looking out this window, there’s barely anyone outside on a 24th night. Shortly, buses and metro will be taking a long break for the next 30hours, to barely resume on the 26th. Perfect time for Uber to capitalize on their surge price.
This is a great Christmas destination for families, couples in love and returning friends with benefit. My idea for this years Christmas was to go to a new place that comes alive during Christmas. You know, a place where people are jumping, dancing, celebrating, streets decorated to the T, lively, good music, a place where Christmas is celebrated maybe some fire works to top it off. Certain parts of Africa live up to this.
The tons of site with misleading information all claim London to be the top spot for the holidays. Well, they missed out the part of “top spot for seniors and family people”, myself unfortunately being neither of both. But it’s not all downers, you get to learn from my experience. Yay!
Come to London, I’m glad I came. However if you’re coming to London for Christmas, it might be more comforting to bring a warm body with you. Or have a contact here to show you around, take you to house parties and holiday get togethers. Better still, come during warmer seasons and seasons when the city is operational (like New Years Eve).
London is windy. Not necessarily cold, at this time anyway but the wind makes you think it’s colder than it really is.
All that said, I would live here for 3months if I could.
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays Guv’nor!
With Love,
Famous Steve.
