So, we are in London. The weather has been pretty rainy. Go figure... Anyway, it's somewhat the same as I recal from 10 years ago and somewhat different. We are getting out to areas I did not get to experience last time too, so that accounts for some of the differences in perception.
We went to south London. It apparently has a reputation os being abit rougher. Why is the south of everything always like that? It's true in L.A., Chicago, San Francisco, Cheyenne Wyo., London, and several other places I've been. Odd.
However, I did not notice anything overtly "bad". Yes, it was lower income. You could tell the people walking around did not have as many material things. There was one totally drunk guy walking the street, can of beer in hand, singing. But, I suppose you could have run into that anywhere in the world. No one approached us in a threatening manner, several people were helpful in giving us directions, and we did not feel unsafe at any time. It's kind of like South Sanfrancisco maybe. It has a bit of a bad rep, but I would move there. You would have to be selective about where, but there are plenty of places within reason. South Central L.A., no.
The Tubes have been cleaned up a lot. Subway stations are always gritty, but these are better than I remember them being. Certainly better than New York and just as heavily used. Culturally it's tremendous. We are here looking at art colleges and I believe the ones we've seen are better than the ones we've seen in the U.S. The facilities are maintained better, and the philosophy is more about getting work done rather than art for arts sake or as a purely academic exercise. But there is clearly an academic flavor about what they are doing.
Well, more later. We are going to start seeing the sites tomorrow. We plan to see a number of museums and such.
John
We went to south London. It apparently has a reputation os being abit rougher. Why is the south of everything always like that? It's true in L.A., Chicago, San Francisco, Cheyenne Wyo., London, and several other places I've been. Odd.
However, I did not notice anything overtly "bad". Yes, it was lower income. You could tell the people walking around did not have as many material things. There was one totally drunk guy walking the street, can of beer in hand, singing. But, I suppose you could have run into that anywhere in the world. No one approached us in a threatening manner, several people were helpful in giving us directions, and we did not feel unsafe at any time. It's kind of like South Sanfrancisco maybe. It has a bit of a bad rep, but I would move there. You would have to be selective about where, but there are plenty of places within reason. South Central L.A., no.
The Tubes have been cleaned up a lot. Subway stations are always gritty, but these are better than I remember them being. Certainly better than New York and just as heavily used. Culturally it's tremendous. We are here looking at art colleges and I believe the ones we've seen are better than the ones we've seen in the U.S. The facilities are maintained better, and the philosophy is more about getting work done rather than art for arts sake or as a purely academic exercise. But there is clearly an academic flavor about what they are doing.
Well, more later. We are going to start seeing the sites tomorrow. We plan to see a number of museums and such.
John
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