Which, technically speaking, is in no way home. But it’s the place I’ve enjoyed the most of anyplace I’ve ever been. Classes are finished, and I have a boring week and a half to kill before I start working full-time. Santa Fe has pretty scenery and nothing else of interest. “Home” as in where I’m from is Philly, a city I can enjoy from a visitor’s perspective but can’t consider home.
I miss pubs (and being able to drink legally, for that matter). Cider. Post-pub kebabs or curries on the way home. The Prince Charles cinema of Leicester square. The British Museum. The London museum. Actually, all the museums. Hyde Park and the crazies at Speakers Corner on Sundays. The Tube and double-decker buses (I know; Londoners whine, but you guys have a damn fine public transport system). The house I lived in was ten minutes walk from White Hart Lane; I miss the excitement of games and football in general. The history that almost everything in London has (subway stations built in the mid-1800’s? Office buildings rebuilt after being destroyed in WWI? centuries-old churches across the street from brand-new buildings?). I miss some of the food - McVitties, Walkers crisps, Mars bars, those mozzarella-and-tomato salads from Pret a Manger, cheese and onion pasties. I miss the international-ness of London (I lived with or worked with people from…15 different countries, at least, in six months there).
I know that once I get busy with something again, the feeling will fade. And I’m hoping to be able to get back to London for at least a few days next summer, but that’s a very long time from now.
London-based Dopers, do me a favor and do something…London-y this weekend. Head out to one of the museums or go for a walk in one of the parks or something, and let me live vicariously through you.
How about doing something really daring and going somewhere other than London? The UK has so much more to offer than just an overcrowded, overpriced and overrun city.
I’ve only visited Londonium twice but hope to get back there again. The cosmopolitan, international feeling is one of those intangible things that was so great. It reminded me of growing up in the DC area.
Garius, I’ve never had any particularly bad experiences of London, I just don’t like it much!
I have nothing against London, I just choose not to go there unless I really have to. In fact, I’ll be down there in a few months’ time to see the First Emperor exhibition at the British Museum but I’m taking my mother for protection…
And Wolverhampton is much better? (I spent a month and a half in Wolverhampton and just about went crazy. On the plus side, I discovered I loved Indian/Pakistani food). Scotland is where it’s at.
I know what you mean NinjaChick. It’s been almost 4 years and I still miss my foreign home, Budapest. I spent five years there and they were among the best and worst five years of my life. The feeling will fade, but you’ll never forget it. And if you really want to go back, try to look for opportunities to do so. It’s not easy, but it’s worth looking into if that’s what you want to do.
From the fact that Slough is the setting of the original The Office, I get the impression that nobody likes it much and that it’s perceived as just a bland industrial/commercial district with few amenities or attractions.
I’ve missed Germany since I came back in 1978, and I haven’t managed to make it back since. Europe is so bloody expensive for Americans that I don’t know how people do it unless they are willing to camp or hostel.
That helps, thanks. And it reminds me that one of the few good things about being where I am now is that my commute this summer will be a thirty-second walk from a dorm to the library.
I’m actually seriously considering trying to go to grad school in London.
I get the feeling. I lived in Blighty for ten years. I miss it to this day.
Fry ups at the chip shop. John Peel on the radio. Jimmy Saville “fixing it.” Most of all, strawberry picking in the summertime… where it isn’t too hot!
I’ve only visited London, but it’s a bit bustly for me. Send me to East Anglia (Bury St. Edmunds) or Oxfordshire (Banbury) and I’m happy. I was shocked (perhaps stupidly, though) that I saw so many McDonald’s and KFC when I was last over in 2004. Ick.
Brit Dopers, have a trayful of Mr Kipling’s and a Lilt for me.
There are only two places I’ve ever been that are world places - London and New York - huge and scary cities. They both make anywhere else look like toy town.
At the moment (22:02) I can go outside and read my most recent copy of Private Eye.
(I spent a month and a half in Wolverhampton and just about went crazy. On the plus side, I discovered I loved Indian/Pakistani food). Scotland is where it’s at.