London Scenes

Restricted Entry
“What is your reason for coming to England?” the immigrations official asked me in the usual supercilious manner adopted by airport personnel around the world.
.....“I’m on holiday from my studies in Belgium,” I replied courteously.
.....“And what is it, maay I axk, that you study over there in Belgium?” he inquired, his crude cockney origins betrayed in every word he uttered.
.....“Philosophy,” I responded, thinking that would be the end of the conversion, as it usually was.

.....But he was having none of it.
.....“Ohhhh, philosophy,” he bellowed, loud enough for just about everyone in Heathrow Airport to hear. “Look ‘ere, Harold,” he said to his portly colleague in the next booth. “We got us a regular Schopenhauer wid us today.”
.....The other people on line were turning around to stare at me now and I was beginning to become self-conscious.
.....“So tell me, Mr. Philosopher,” the immigration official said with mockery in his voice. “What sort of Phi-los-o-phy are you studying over there in the marvelous kingdom of Belgium.”
.....I decided to teach this stupid little cockney jerk a lesson. “Post-Thomistic, neo-scholastic metaphysical skepticism, focused primarily on the later works of William of Ockham,” I said as arrogantly as I could, waiting for the look of utter bewilderment to appear on his face.
.....“Oh,” he said with bored indifference. “I would have thought that in a place as sophisticated as Belgium they would have been more into the phenomenological epistemology of Heidegger or Husserl. A bit behind the times, ain’t they?”
.....With that he stamped my passport and called for the next person on line.

Ennui
“Maureen, we are going to the most superfabulous bar in all of London. The beer is incredible, the food is supposedly outstanding, and they say the place is filled with fascinating people from all over England. All of us are going. Don’t you want to join us?” I asked.
.....“No,” she replied, and turned around and walked away.

Existential Fish
“I’ll have haddock and chips,” I said to the Pakistani fellow behind the counter at McGill’s Fish and Chips Emporium, located in the Highbridge section of London not far from our hotel.
.....“No haddock,” he replied, barely looking at me from behind the counter.
.....“Ok, then I’ll have cod and chips.”
.....“No cod,” he said, again with barely a glance.
.....“Isn’t this supposed to be a fish and chips place?” I asked, extremely confused now.
.....“Yes, but no fish today.”
.....“Ok,” I said in desperation, my empty stomach now beginning to growl fiercely. “Then just give me some chips.”
.....“No chips.”
.....“Well, what do you have to eat?” I wondered.
.....“Eat?” he said, looking up at me with confusion reigning in his eyes. “Why do you want to eat?”
.....“Because I’m hungry,” I said.
.....“We are all hungry,” he replied and went back to staring blankly out of the window of his shop.

Yorkshire Pudding

A hot date in London, a beautiful companion, a traditional English restaurant in Kensington.
.....My order: Roast beef with Yorkshire pudding. What could be more traditional than that? I think to myself.
.....The meal comes: rare beef and some tiny biscuits floating in gravy.
.....On the side is the creamy white pudding in a stainless steel serving bowl. I scoop out a heaping spoonful of the white stuff and stuff it into my mouth while my date watches.
.....Important lesson learned: What they refer to in England as “pudding” is actually the crappy little biscuits floating in the gravy. The white stuff is most assuredly NOT pudding, but some noxious British concoction that they serve to unsuspecting American tourists to punish us for our economic superiority and military prowess. Mine ended up spewed out of my mouth and onto the expensive new dress my date was wearing.
.....That was our first date. And it was our last.