London And Being A Decent Human Being
London town and its people
As you may know, I am a white, working-class immigrant. I barely finished high school, never went to university, and learned the English language in a kitchen of a dear friend of mine. There was a lot of homemade wine consumed during the lessons.
I continued my life in the UK, London. I wrote about my arrival in this, short piece:
I went for a run and some kettlebell exercises today. While I was pleasantly torturing myself I kept thinking about me being an immigrant on the land of Albion. I must say, I am lucky that I am based in London. Most of us over here are from somewhere else.
When I meet a true Londoner, I am surprised. I remember when I met a girl in an underground rave party who was a true Londoner, I couldn’t believe it. Probably I scared her. Imagine yourself, here comes a guy talking in broken English, high on MDMA, asking — “ You from London?!?! That’s good, that’s amazing! I don’t know London people! Cool!”
London is like a person with a mental disorder. Not totally crazy but if it’s pushed to the corner it might lose it.
London is overcrowded, a million faces town. We bring different flavours to this madness. We are a multilayered, society of different experiences brought from every corner of this planet.
I came across people from almost all corners of this globe, Afghans, Pakistanis, Indians, Jews, Americans from the USA, and Americans from the South of the Americas. Africans from countries I never heard of and Africans from countries I’ve heard of. The list is endless.
There are English men and women who were born in London. They are the true minority of this town. I am surprised by how tolerant they are. As long as you don’t shit on their doorstep they are ready to accept you.
London was like that for a long time, people came and people left. People brought their strange ways of seeing this world. Sometimes English fought back. There were racial and national unrests in the history of London but in the end, it worked out. Neo-Nazis went into hiding and more tolerant people appeared.
There is still racism, it’s not like people don’t say stupid things to each other. This type of stupidity is known among immigrants. White immigrants are suspicious of not-so-white immigrants until they marry each other. Carribeans look down on Africans until they bring each other’s children. Sikhs from Kenya are not too friendly with Sikhs from Afghanistan until they find out that they are relatives. The Indian cast system still thrives over here.
Life goes on.
What I don’t like is that the ruling class want us to be segregated. They push the Englishness to the side and tell minorities to enjoy their own culture and ignore the English one. I don’t get that. I think it brings more problems and fewer solutions.
I listened to the interview with the known ex-football player, John Barnes. He made a few valid points regarding these problems.
In conclusion of this short piece:
Try not to be an arsehole.
In essence, all people are people who want to be happy.
Remember where you came from but don’t think that it was better or worse. It was different.
Freedom is worth fighting for.
Learn from history and apply the knowledge to all life situations.
