It finally happened yesterday
It's after 3 am in London and I just got back from taking a walk with the dog. The inevitable happened and Terrorism once again hit London, this time it didn't take most by surprise...We've expected it but all the same it was a big shock. I finally heard from one of my brothers and my mum whom I had been trying to contact all day long and although neither of them live close to where it happened they are often on those routes. Between the anxiety and the relief I guess I was finally able to relax and sleep soon over took me early in the evening which now leaves me restless.
Earlier in the evening I stopped by my sister and took the wee ones to pick up some McDonald and while waiting for one of them to come out of a store (she stopped to get a teen magazine or something) I parked not too far from a mosque, where prayers were going on as they usually do and gazed in wonderment at the attendees...Children in their various Islamic garb, women and even little girls in their burka's. I noticed two young men so obviously from the Baltic and maybe even new to this country...don't ask, I could tell from their hair cuts, the clothes and the bone structure where they were from, besides they make up a large amount of the population of that area.
Scenes like this may scare some native Brits especially the older generation and the narrow minded bigots, but for me it's what makes London so different and special, because although I enjoy life in a Californian coastal town as well as other parts of America, I often miss the diversity that London offers, something that all the Lebanese, Chinese, Indian and Greek restaurants don't offer in Los Angeles or Dallas. It still amazes me when I hop on the Tube or bus and hear so many languages being spoken...makes this big wide world so much smaller and that's comforting to me. But today I just couldn't help wonder what sort of world it was turning into and if this is going to lead to The armageddon we all fear and for one moment the women and little girls in their Burka's and their men folk looked sinister and threatening. As my good friend Jerome the painter sometime cab driver pointed out, when our parents came from Africa and the West Indies, they integrated and they sent us their children to the same schools the British went too, now they new immigrants are sending their children to Islamic schools and aren't either learning English or going to the same pubs...Actually they just skip the pubs. I could tell you more about what Jerome says, but then I'd begin to sound like a bigot.
I just want to be able to go on a train and not worry about been blown to smithereens.
Earlier in the evening I stopped by my sister and took the wee ones to pick up some McDonald and while waiting for one of them to come out of a store (she stopped to get a teen magazine or something) I parked not too far from a mosque, where prayers were going on as they usually do and gazed in wonderment at the attendees...Children in their various Islamic garb, women and even little girls in their burka's. I noticed two young men so obviously from the Baltic and maybe even new to this country...don't ask, I could tell from their hair cuts, the clothes and the bone structure where they were from, besides they make up a large amount of the population of that area.
Scenes like this may scare some native Brits especially the older generation and the narrow minded bigots, but for me it's what makes London so different and special, because although I enjoy life in a Californian coastal town as well as other parts of America, I often miss the diversity that London offers, something that all the Lebanese, Chinese, Indian and Greek restaurants don't offer in Los Angeles or Dallas. It still amazes me when I hop on the Tube or bus and hear so many languages being spoken...makes this big wide world so much smaller and that's comforting to me. But today I just couldn't help wonder what sort of world it was turning into and if this is going to lead to The armageddon we all fear and for one moment the women and little girls in their Burka's and their men folk looked sinister and threatening. As my good friend Jerome the painter sometime cab driver pointed out, when our parents came from Africa and the West Indies, they integrated and they sent us their children to the same schools the British went too, now they new immigrants are sending their children to Islamic schools and aren't either learning English or going to the same pubs...Actually they just skip the pubs. I could tell you more about what Jerome says, but then I'd begin to sound like a bigot.
I just want to be able to go on a train and not worry about been blown to smithereens.
posted by Brynn Lamont at 3:30 AM
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