London incidents

I went to see my pal in London a few times. I was about eighteen to twenty years old and he could get me flight tickets for a tenner. So I'd fly to London on the Friday night after work, go out and get pissed for two nights and fly back on Sunday. Occasionally I would fly down for just one night. Very jet set. The taxi to the airport cost more than the flights.

He lived in Hounslow which is a cultural hot pot. A bit of everything.

He lived in a rented house with four other guys who were very decent. But their house was a fucking tip. The kitchen was a disaster area. Unwashed plates, mugs, food in the frying pan left for days. I washed up once and one of them walked in and laughed, asking "What the fuck are you doing?  Just leave that."

One particular event made me laugh. They didn't use a hoover...for a good reason. One day, someone dropped lump of hash on the carpet and with the shitey brown design, they couldn't see it, so we were all down on our hands and knees crawling round looking for this wee lump of hash. They eventually found it and the day was saved.

I also once experienced a "deal" in front of me. One of them called someone and within ten minutes a car pulled up and the guy came in and sat on the sofa. He got out these wee scales about five inches high and started weighing out hash for them.

I never smoked it. I was more than happy just getting pissed.

The people that lived in Hounlsow were a source of entertainment for me.

Walking along the street behind some old man, he was sort of "jiving" along the pavement. His hands were shaking to some silent beat and he was bobbing around. As he approached people he would stamp his feet as he came to halt in front of them, and bring his hands up to the side of his face, shaking them shouting "Ta Dah !" as if he'd just finished some sort of performance. He continued this all the way along Hounslow high street.

I went to the supermarket and was buying dinner. A tin of beans. The old man in the queue behind me just asked me if I was having the beans for my dinner then asked me if I had a job which he seemed very impressed with. Short and sweet.

There was a pub along the road my pal took me to which he warned me could get a bit rough as it was used by soldiers from a nearby barracks who clashed with the regulars. On the night we were in it was very quiet and he was facing the door. For good reason. He'd positioned us away from the main area, near the back and the pool table, and apparently the fire exit. For good reason. He saw the soldiers come in and warned me. After about thirty minutes the fighting started. My pal obviously used to this just grabbed my arm and dragged me over behind a wide pillar and there we crouched with our pints. He warned me that it was a favourite of theirs to throw the glass ashtrays at each other. And this I will never forget because within seconds one of those glass ashtrays smashed against the pillar above my head and I still remember the sight of the shards of glass spraying inches away from my face. I think we left by the fire exit.

One other pub we went to I saw a young man holding court to several visitors. He was wearing an absurd jumper with a huge collar and lapels...on a jumper. His fingers were covered in chunky gold rings and he was drinking a coke. A succession of people would walk over to him and talk in hushed tones before a series of nods and thanks and they would leave.

My pal went out one evening to meet up with other mates in a wine bar in Kingston. At the end of the night we went out looking a taxi and outside there was a very tall black man sitting on the bonnet of a gleaming white Mercedes with one foot up on the bumper showing off his leather boots. He was built like a brick shithouse.

"Yaw lookin for a tawxi mawn?" he drawled very slowly in his thick Jamaican accent. We negotiated £15 and to his credit he took us straight home. Didn't mug or murder us. There's no way now I get a lift off some guy in the street.

I still remember the first time I bought a round in my friends local and asked for two pints and the guy said £5.30. It was the early 90s when I could get two for about £3 in Glasgow.  I said to him innocently I only wanted two. He said he knew that. I was a bit embarrassed. Bloody London prices.