England is my father.
If you’re an American as I am, England is your father too, regardless of your racial nationality.
He’s truly my father, since not only am I an American, but despite a lot of Sicilian blood much of my ancestry is from English and Welsh families.
The UK is a very particular type of father, though. He’s the father who, in his prime, was the most powerful Alpha Male in the world. A man who ruled all. A man to be respected, feared, and emulated. Many years later, as an old man, he’s a quiet, near powerless old beta, sitting in the corner, being bullied by his wife. Every once and awhile he says some silly things, and he’s nothing like the man he was in his prime. He still has that glint in his eye though, and he has a shotgun leaning against the wall next to him, so he’s not completely unfeared, but many other younger, more Alpha men in the same room have machineguns and howitzers.
I love my father. Whenever I visit England, I feel a sense of connection, family and honor I don’t get anywhere else in the world, including my home America. At the same time, I have to look at the world objectively, and admit what my father has become. Going to England is always bittersweet.
The UK used to be the largest empire known to man. The British Empire controlled almost one-fourth of the entire planet Earth. Just think about that. One-fourth! A simple governor of a distant British colony had more power than the President of the United States. Utterly amazing.
Contrary to today’s Societal Programming, the British Empire, despite its problems, was largely a good thing in history that brought a lot of light to a largely dark world. With the world under the Crown, standards of living went up, technological advances increased, commerce and trade prospered, and many barbaric practices like human sacrifice were wiped from existence.
Today…well, it’s a little different to say the least. Today the UK yet another small, left-wing, politically correct, bank-ruled, socialist, near bankrupt European nation, with national debt that’s tripled in just the last ten years, a bankrupt government healthcare system, with London citizens burning up about Muslim immigrants while sitting in some of the world’s worst traffic, caused by eco-friendly bike lanes no one uses. With the recent pro-Brexit vote, which I supported, they took a small step in the right direction, but like with us in the collapsing US, it was too little, too late. Brexit can’t save the UK any more than Trump can save the US. In a few years, we’re all pitching off this waterfall together. (I use the royal “we” when I say that; when the shit hits the fan I’ll be long gone.)
This is the first time I’ve spent an extended period of time in London, a full week. I’m traveling in Europe for a few weeks with my with my mom (yeah, seriously), to take her on her first trip outside the US in order to see her distant relatives in Sicily before she gets too old to make trips like this. London is a stopover on the way to Italy. Because I’m with her, I’m not traveling with my usual efficiency, but I can still review the cites I’ll be spending time in. Today, it’s London. Let do this…
1. Rich culture. We Americans have no culture. We think we do. Nike and Spider-Man and double cheeseburgers and things like that, but that’s not what I’m talking about. Our nation is only 240 years old. We have a detailed history within those 240 years, but compared to England’s 2000 years and China’s 4000 years, we’re pathetic, cultural pygmies. As Americans, particularly those few Americans like me who bother to travel outside of their homeland, we sometimes feel this, seeking a deeper culture we never had, trying to fill a hole in our being that’s difficult to describe.
The UK doesn’t have this problem. Walking around London, seeing the fantastic architecture and the rich history behind it all is simply breathtaking, and I really mean that. Instead of the cookie cutter buildings of the US, London buildings (much like the rest of Europe and the Old World) are intricate, ornate, and full of character. Like in Washington DC, the buildings here are all squat and tiny, rarely going above five or six stories. They also have drab stone colors, not colorful at all like cities such as Melbourne or Dallas, but these are minor complaints. Here’s an example of a random building to illustrate what I’m talking about:
I sat inside Westminster Abbey, arguably the most important church in the world outside the Vatican, standing in the same spot where British kings have been coronated and married for over a thousand years. I stood just outside the Houses of Parliament and Buckingham Palace, places where, at one time, one-fourth of the planet was ruled.
We Americans don’t have culture like this. We don’t have history like this. I’m jealous of my British brothers. You have what I never will.
I was constantly moved while in London, deeply.
My mom felt the same. However, as a former nun and Roman Catholic, she had mixed feelings about being around all these Episcopalian Brits, which Roman Catholics tend to think of as “fake” Catholics. I took her to mass in Westminster Abbey one morning, and as I took in all the wonderful medieval architecture around us, feeling a swell of pride for my ancestors, my mom said,
“Pssh. Episcopalians! These people are heretics. Jesus never wanted all this ornate shit.”
~BD’s Mom, former nun and sweet old lady
Normally I would remind her that Vatican City for “true” Catholics like her goes far beyond “ornate,” but when you’re over the age of about 70 or so (my mom is 73), any Societal Programming you haven’t cleaned out is permanently baked into your brain with a nice hard crust. That’s why talking to old people is so much fun.
2. The people. London is one of the most diverse and multinational cities in the world. Blacks and Asians are uncommon but present, but Middle Easterners, Indians, Russians, and non-British Europeans are not only common, but based on what I saw, easily outnumber native born Londoners. And just to be clear, I’m not talking about the touristy areas (of which there are many, more on this in a minute); I’m talking about just normal London neighborhoods.
This was echoed by many old guys I talked to, who bemoaned that the only true Londoners left are the taxi drivers. That may not be far from the truth. Sadly, this may have lead to much of the Brexit fervor, which is plastered over all the newspapers and magazines here. I favor Brexit for the UK for economic and sovereignty reasons, not for immigration or racial reasons, but I may be in the minority of Brexit supporters in this.
People like Italians, Germans, Indians, and many other nationalities and races are everywhere, and I mean everywhere. I was also very surprised to hear people speak with American accents as well (though I’d bet they were mostly Canadians, since Americans are quite insular and don’t travel outside their “number one” country very much). This is very unusual; London is perhaps the only city outside the US I’ve ever visited where you can hear any American/Canadian accents.
No one is fat here. Everyone is trim and skinny. It’s so odd for an American like myself to visit a massive city where overweight people are extremely rare, since fatsos are the norm where I live. I’ve been traveling the world and I’m still not used to this. Funny.
One disturbing thing is Londoners’ skin. Holy shit, it’s horrible. I can officially say that London people have the worst skin of any city in the world I’ve ever visited in my life. The landscape is filled with middle age women who have faces covered with deep, hard wrinkles, making them look much older (and uglier) than they should be. Young people aren’t immune either; young faces covered with huge red zits, pimples, rosacea and acne is shockingly common here. It’s very odd and a little off-putting.
My guess is this is a result of the combination of the prevalence of smoking cigarettes (it doesn’t look to be quite as demonized here as in the US), genetics, lack of sunscreen, and diet. But I’m only speculating. Something is very wrong with how Londoners take care of their damn skin. Holy crap.
Now let’s get to the stereotype of British people having bad teeth. There is some truth to this, but it’s not nearly as bad as American pop culture likes to poke fun about. Most people’s teeth are just as good/bad as American teeth, but there does seem to be an increased amount of crooked teeth, vampire fangs, and other oral weirdness here.
Case in point, I had a massage a few days ago here, and my massage girl was named Hailee. Hailee was young and super cute, and that sexy British accent…mmmmm. But when she smiled she looked like an orc. God dammit, Hailee. Why didn’t your parents fix those Mordor fangs? Or at least get you some invisialign?
The point is, few young, cute American women like Hailee would have teeth that bad. Interesting.
Speaking of women…
3. The women. You’ve probably heard that British women are ugly. Well, I tried to debunk that while I was here, but I’m sorry to say that’s not far from the truth. I wouldn’t go as far as to say they’re ugly, but spending time in London is just like spending time in China, where I see millions of women, don’t consider them ugly per se, but don’t see any I’d be happy about having sex with. Over a one or two day period of seeing bazillions of women, I might see one or two that I consider cute, and even then at least one of them will be a visiting tourist, not a true blue London woman.
To be fair, it’s all about perception and experience. If you’ve lived in London your entire life and have never traveled to other cities outside of the UK, you probably have a very different view of what I just said, and probably think there are plenty of hot women in London. But as a guy who’s seen women in cities all over the world, London ranks extremely low. On my city chart of female attractiveness, London ranks in the “below average” zone just below cities like Detroit and Philadelphia. (Yes, I see more attractive women in places like Detroit and Philly than in London, and considering London is a much larger city than both of those, that gives you an idea of how bad it is.)
This intrigued me, so I started to pay close attention to possible reasons why these women were less attractive than most other places. I came up with two theories:
– The eyes, noses, and mouths of British women (or should I say, London women, since it would be unfair of me to paint with too broad a brush) are all very close together. This gives their faces a scrunched look, where the face is small but the rest of the head is too big.
– Upturned and downturned noses are very common here. Unlike Sydney, Australia, where women’s noses are very different yet the women are still very hot, London noses give women a strange Queen Elizabeth look, which is not good (or at least not good to American eyes).
– The skin problem described above.
– The teeth problem described above.
4. The men. The men here, like in most of Europe, are small as compared to American, Canadian, and Australian men. Men in London are shorter, have smaller and more narrow shoulders, smaller torsos, and skinnier legs. Per the usual European fashion styles, they wear very tight, skinny pants that make their already skinny legs look even skinnier. I’m not tall, but I look like an ogre compared to these guys. I joked to my mom that I could pick up one of these little guys at random and snap him in half. (I joke, my UK brothers, I joke.)
While the women here aren’t very good looking, the men don’t seem to have that problem. It’s always been hard for me to judge male attractiveness, but it seems like the men are decent looking in London. Meaning they’re getting the shit end of the deal (better looking men, uglier women; not a good city for masculine living in my book).
5. The food. It’s pretty lame. They love their meat here, just like I do, but the overall tastiness of the food is pretty shitty as compared to other cultures. However, this is a good thing, because keeping on track with my diet has been very easy here. The odd British need to wrap everything in a pie hasn’t tempted me at all. Coolness.
6. Invaded by tourists. Good fucking god. There are certain parts of London, mostly around The Thames, that are absolutely overrun by mobs of tourists. I’ve never seen anything like it. My hotel was by the Westminster Bridge, which is a great spot, but every time we had to cross the damn thing we had to wade though mountains of European and Asian tourists, standing around, talking to each other, taking pictures, taking selfies, joking around, bumping into each other, and acting like idiots. It’s like this all the way down the river, on both sides, reaching into The City (London’s financial district) and beyond.
It’s like trying to navigate through Disneyland at high rush hour. I’m not sure what it is about London that attracts so many tourists above and beyond other cities. A testament to the honor people feel towards the old British Empire I guess. So take it as a compliment, Brits. Pain in the ass though.
7. Subpar European infrastructure. This is the part where I piss off a lot of you by complaining about the declining West and the inefficiency of Europe as compared to American and Asian standards. Before you freak out too much, I will say that London is clearly a few steps above the infrastructure of Australia (which was surprisingly bad) and I’m sure when I review Rome and Sicily next week the infrastructure there is going to be worse as well. Yet as always, I have to be objective about this stuff and tell you where London is failing as compared to other first world cultures.
I’ll start by saying something nice. The subway system in London is actually pretty good. I was expecting a shit show like Australia’s subways, but was surprised to see that London’s subways (called “the underground” or “the tube”) are very organized, well managed, and always have very clear signs. Never once did I have trouble navigating its system or have any trouble whatsoever getting from A to B. Well done.
The only two problems is A) it’s a little expensive, especially compared to Asia, and B) the subway cars are very small, smaller than any other city I’ve yet visited, creating a claustrophobic feel to them. (Again, if you’ve lived in London your whole life and have never traveled abroad, you may not even notice this).
Thertefore, London’s subways are a notch above most American cities, several notches above Australia, but still light-years behind Asia like the rest of the declining West. Not horrible, but being accustomed to Asia’s subways we in the West have a long way to go.
Now let’s get to the bad shit. Before we left for our big trip, I had to sit down my high energy, high extroverted mother, who has never been outside the country before, and explain to her that Europe is different than America. She had to expect that Europe moves slower and has more stuff that doesn’t work. I told her to expect trouble at places like the airport, hotels, taxis, and tourist areas, and to not freak out. Things that don’t work, things that are closed in the middle of the day for no reason, stupid rules that make no sense, etc.
Was I right? Yup. A few examples from London…
– Flying into London, our plane had to circle around the airport for 25 minutes for some reason. I’ve been in flights hundreds of times in the US and Asia and this almost never happens there.
– Flying out of London, we had to sit in our plane, on the runway, for 45 minutes because a part wasn’t working, then because “another plane was in our way.” I shit you not.
– The air conditioner in our hotel room didn’t work unless at least one light was turned on. The fan would blow, but no cold air would come out. That was fun to figure out.
– Taxi drivers here semi-regularly can’t take credit or debt cards because their “machine is broken” (or they’re lying). Irritating as fuck.
– Twice our hot water didn’t work, and this was in a nice, upscale hotel.
– One key subway station, located right in the financial district, was closed. I mean the entire station was closed. I’ve never seen any city close down an entire station before. Close down parts of a station, sure. Temporarily close down certain lines, yeah. But an entire station? Shit. Several mini-crowds of tour groups were milling around in front of the station in dazed confusion. Because of all this, my mom and I had to take a nice, long, unexpected, expensive cab ride in the middle of the night, and waste a day travel pass for the subway. Fun.
– There are no street signs here! Yes, you heard me right. WTF?!? This has been the most irritating part of my trip here. I’m always armed with a pocket map, a compass, and Google Maps, so I can always navigate any city, but not having street signs makes navigating at least five times more difficult and time consuming. Every once and a while, if you’re very lucky, there will be a white street sign plastered on a nearby building, but this is only in perhaps one out of 15 intersections. Man, it sucks. To be fair, there are some American cities that don’t have street signs on certain intersections, but nothing like this. Not cool, London.
Ah, Europe. (I can’t wait to see all the shit that doesn’t work in Italy.)
8. Friendly, polite people. Like with most Western, English speaking countries outside the United States, people here are extremely friendly. The British are also hugely polite, easily the most polite white people on planet Earth. Only the Japanese are more so (and even then, they’re full of shit, since the Japanese are also the most secretly racist people on Earth).
British Societal Programming emphasizes politeness and toned down emotions more so than American, Australian, and even Canadian cultures, and it shows. British people are hugely pleasant to talk to and I always thoroughly enjoy conversations with them. If London wasn’t so ridiculously expensive, and if the women here were a little hotter, it would be one of the most livable big cities in the world for this reason alone.
That wraps it up for London! Next up, Rome…
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Are you actually visiting England? The Conservative government is somewhere to the right of Donald Trump. It’s not a left-wing country at all – quite the opposite. Read some of the newspapers (The Daily Mail and The Telegraph would be a start). There is not even a viable left-wing party in the UK any more.
Comment deleted for violation of Rule Number Five.
Napoleon in the Tower of London? In which particular history book did you read this?
No. I’ve actually never been to England and I’m making this all up.
That’s easy, since Donald Trump not a right-wing conservative. He’s an authoritarian nationalist, which is a completely different thing. Hell, I’m to the “right” of Donald Trump on most issues and I’m not even a Republican.
This is always a source of confusion when Americans and Europeans use the terms right-wing and left-wing, since the European scale for these terms is so different from the American scale. You’re a European, so to you, the current government of the UK is “right-wing.” I’m an American, so to me, England is still not only left-wing, but extreme left (i.e. you have government healthcare, you cant even buy a gun, etc).
Always remember that although this blog has an international audience, it’s written by an American, living in America, and using American terms, even if those terms sound like European terms.
You may dislike my American status (I don’t like it either; that’s why I’m leaving my fucked-up country) but that’s who I am.
The little historical blurbs inside the fortress. Napoleon used it as a staging area at one point(?). My memory is hazy. If he never actually visited there, I will amend the article above.
Based on the first three comments in this thread, I have a feeling I know the direction many of these comments are going to go. So if you live in the UK and are upset about some of the things I said about London (which I liked on the overall), just remember that I bash my own country far, FAR more often than I bash your country, or any other country. If I can calmly and rationally listen to and accept the negatives and constructive criticism about my country from foreigners without getting upset, defensive, or nitpicky, you should be able to do the same.
Remember that patriotism is just another form of false Societal Programming. “Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all others because you were born in it.” ~William Shakespeare
It’s true with my country, and it’s true with your country. I know cultural Societal Programming is strong, but try to be objective, and I promise to do the same.
I’m from England. Been to London a number of times, and can say BD is pretty much on the money really.
Let’s face it: Brexit isn’t going to save shit for the UK in the long run (though I dread to think what the fuck we’d be in for down the line had we stayed in the EU).
I agree with BD’s overview. Any guy from the UK reading this and thinking “Bloody Yank, what does he know?!!” should go and read his other posts where he does indeed slag off his own country’s failings.
As a Londoner who has travelled and lived abroad, I’d agree with a lot of his comments but disagree with some.
The Service industry in this country (and Europe) sucks compared to Asia and the US. If a dish is poor or the heating doesn’t work it’s almost like they are looking at you and thinking “So!?” It hits me more and more when I come back here and you only have to walk through arrivals at a London airport to see how miserable people are.
Regarding the tube, there are now air conditioned trains being run out which you can walk all the way through which avoids the classic ‘600 people crammed into one carriage and three in the next one down’.
As for British girls, I’d put them on a par with American girls. I lived in New York & California and initially I was amazed by the amount of plump (not fat) girls who just wore sweatshirt & jeans all the time. However once I started going out socially in my local; neighbourhood (Brooklyn) there were some stunning girls in bars, coffee shops, stores etc..
I think we both encountered what I call ‘Central city’ game. All the hot girls have jobs and so by and large, the only girls in the day are tourists, students and out-of-towners.
After work on the street and in bars, it’s a different ball game. I used to daygame a lot in Central London on weekends but the quality girls just weren’t there. However if I go to my local coffee shops in zone 2 or 3, on a weekend there are loads of attractive English girls. Why? Because most girls who work in the city, don’t want to travel back in on a weekend. They’d rather get up late, meet their friends and have brunch in a chill café not slog through the hordes of tourists on Oxford Street.
Enjoy Rome, mate! Ciao.
“No one is fat here. Everyone is trim and skinny.”
There’s a lesson in there, chaps.
Hey BD,
Kinda off topic, but I completely agree with what you said about Japanese people being polite on the outside and racist on the inside. I’m curious though; how did you arrive at that conclusion?
Don’t know how BD learned, but I lived in Japan for a brief time and I learned that the racism is an integral part of their cultural identity. They view Japan as different and special from the rest of the world and therefore Japanese people are different and special. Which means everyone else who isn’t Japanese just isn’t as good. In general though they aren’t angry racists like we have in the US. It’s just matter-of-fact racism. They aren’t any angrier about white westerners being sub-human than they are angry about water being wet; it’s just apart of their accepted reality, societal programming etc. They treat westerners well but in the same way they treat their pets well; lovely beings but just not as important as humans.
W.R.T. the Japanese, it is true that they are racist, but it’s a “not one of us” racism more than a “INVADERS!” racism.
The Japanese have a concept of the “wa” – harmony (among the Japanese). A gaijin (foreigner) who learns all he can and tries to assimilate as completely as possible isn’t looked down upon, per se, but he can never have the “wa” because he wasn’t born in Japan to Japanese parents. It’s like visiting monks – you will be treated well and taught, but unless you are a monk you’ll always be a visitor.
You can hang out with them. You can live with them. If the family approves, you can even marry them (assuming you’re in a traditional area – it’s looser in the pseudo-European Tokyo, or in the largely Christian Hokkaido). But you’ll never be one of them (though, if you marry a Japanese girl and let her parents have a large part in the family, your children will).
Apparently one of the aspects to the current Japanese government (which is a very pro-Japanese government) is to restrict voting away from all gaijin, so that only those with the wa can decide how Japan will be run. Honestly, I’m not bothered.
I lived in Italy for ten years. You’re in for one hell of a shock.
Two points… I don’t think Napoleon ever visited the tower of London, and Edward I (not III) was the King who fought with and executed William Wallace. (Us Scots are still pretty pissed about that.) The three Edwards about that time were all dramatically different types of rulers. If you are interested in history it is worth a read. And if you are in England you might take the time to read or watch Simon Schama’s “A History of Britain” which, if high velocity, is very good. If you mom is an ex nun she might enjoy that as a Christmas gift. In my experience Nuns like that kind of thing.
One other point… the reason why British teeth are so bad is because the British NHS dental system is so bad. The dental system sits between a public and private service and is a real nightmare. When I moved here from the UK and my American dentist saw my dental XRays he muttered something about “loosing his license if he ever did work like that.”
FWIW, I really love London. I love the tube. I love the atmosphere. I love the people, especially the real Londoners. I love the history and culture. I could probably spend several months just in the British Museum. What I notice though when I travel back to Britain from the USA is that everything seems so small. The little carts at the airport. The signs on the wall. The cup of coffee they give you, the cars and the parking spaces. Everything seems to be in miniature. Which is weird. Because I grew up there. And it ALWAYS freaks me out paying for a refill on my coffee.
Back in the 90s I did a lot of work for Japanese companies and got to know many of them very well. The stuff they said to me about their views on race were quite eye-opening. It was stated best by other commenters above. They’re the most racist people on Earth, but the racism is a different “flavor” than what the West is accustomed to. (Not that it makes it any better. Racism is just more Societal Programming.)
Haha! Yes, I experienced a little of that too. It made me laugh.
Eye carumba I just deleted that entire sentence; too irresistible for nitpickers.
Same here. I spent an afternoon there and I felt like I had only seen 10% of it. Amazing stuff.
That’s not Britain. That’s Europe. I’ll be talking about that in my next post about Italy.
I’m a Brit, but not overly attached to that identification. I see myself as a European (who lives in Asia).
I’d say BD has it mostly right, except the observation that everyone is slim. Not so at all. See http://www.worldobesity.org/resources/world-map-obesity/?map=overview-women
26.8% of UK women are obese. Not as bad as the USA for sure, but still very bad.
Ugly, pinched faces with bad skin, check. Bad teeth, check (though I assure you many Asians give the Brits a run for their money on that one).
There’s a lot to love about the UK, but the women are not physically on a par with most of the rest of Europe, let alone Asia.
Ultimately every country has some form of Racism/Nationalism/subtle prejudice/ingrained anti-foreign mindset.
Japan’s is no worse than Korea’s insular view on dating foreigners or China’s distrust of non-Chinese (and I’ve lived in all three).
Japan also looks down on its own women which is why you get so many Japanese women travelling/living/studying abroad.
Before I lived in the US, I always imagined that it was more racially accepting than here in the UK.
I’d seen black police officers, soldiers, politicians etc.. on tv and thought it would a lot more of a collective as we don’t have that number here in the UK.
However when I arrived, I was shocked that mostly black people just hung out with other black people and Asians with Asians, whites with whites etc..
Here in the UK you will see black, white, Asian guys & girls going out in a group. In the States, I never saw that at all. Recent police shooting events only seem to confirm my view that there’s a racial divide.
I went on holiday to Spain this year with a LTR who happens to be black & a model. I only say that as she dresses very chic & fashionably so she obviously didn’t look like economic migrant/refugee.
The sneering looks we got in Spain were incredible & comments were whispered.
There’s racism here in London both subtle and open, especially after the Brexit vote that was seen as some sort of ‘foreigners out’ initiative.
This is why hate crimes here in the UK have gone up by 51%.
Commenting that “xxxx are so racist” blindly assumes that your country isn’t as bad.
It is, you just don’t want to see it.
You only need to look at U.K. TV programmes versus U.S. programmes to see how poor the British female is against the American. With American TV all the extras and main characters are all pretty good looking.
I was born in England. As a teenager I was extremely lucky to travel across the Atlantic frequently and spent time in both countries. I couldn’t believe how many above average to hot females there were kicking about in the U.S. compared to far fewer in the U.K.
Just look at any dating site for any age group that covers both countries and see what I mean. Mind you, lots more fatties in the U.S.
And now 🙂 I don’t live in either of those countries. Have a good trip BD.
I’m guessing you stayed in the Park Plaza Hotel? Nice spot. I’ve had many dates in that bar!
I wasn’t talking about the UK. I was talking about London. Go to London and walk around for a week. You will clearly see that fat people are extremely rare there.
Racism is part of the human condition. I don’t like it but it’s true.
Correct! I was thinking that bar would be a good place for a first date/meet, but then again it’s almost right in the middle of tourist hell. I’m sure there are better places in London if you did the research. Lots of cool pubs!
I’ve been a lurker here for awhile, and a fan and will be buying your book soon Blackdragon, as soon as my funds clear. I’ve live just outside London and am a regular visitor there.
Interesting article and agree with 80% of it.
There are only three bits I disagree with.
What I’d query, is that with all of your normally clearly insightful observations about the political situation, that you have such a romanticised view of the Empire. Yes, the Empire has been demonised by the liberal/right that’s been in the pockets of the Bankers for the last 50 years but in a shallow way that never explores the issues, but as a way to de-Nationalise a nation’s history. Towards a homogenised EU ideal. My perspective is that the The Empire was very similar to EU and modern Big Government in the US. Every country they got their paws into ended up producing losing the diversity and vitality of their crops and manufacturing, to become a mono crop culture, under cutting the wages of the domestic population, leading in time to the ‘Two Nations’ that Disreali spoke against.
Every county that the Empire took to, lost all it’s vitality – the way a victim of a vampire loses it’s life force – the Indian textile industry lost it’s GDP in increments and the British gained just by those increments and all that money went to a very small elite that built their mansions.
The mono crop culture led to the great Indian Famines of the late 19th century, where one crop may have failed before due to blight, others would take their place just, but after the British arrived – the Indians ended up just like the Irish, with their potato famine – all this was just as Eugenics took hold of the upper classes as an operating system of social order, instead of Christian values.
Here’s a snippet from the BBC documentary called ‘Racism: A History’.
What the Empire did in India, it also did in Africa with the Zulus, to the Chinese with gun boats, when they refused the importation of opium.
I suppose all empires are evil, ie, disconnected from the humans they impact upon. Maybe 20% of it can regarded a beneficial and expansive.
My second point would be about Culture. Yes, Europe has old buildings and a diversity of food that superb, low brow American capitalists seem love to raze to the ground the great historical monuments of their past, such as the demolition of New York’s Astoria Hotel [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waldorf%E2%80%93Astoria_(New_York,_1893) ], Penn Station and the trolley car system that was secretly dismantled by a cabal of motor car manufacturers such as General Motors.
But in many other ways, the US has been remarkably alive culturally and the match of any other culture, despite the huge financial forces trying to consistently homogenise it into something that can fit into a cookie cutter saleable pattern. In it’s music (Jazz, blues, funk, soul, classical), film (‘Citizen Kane’, Vertigo, Godfather parts 1 & 2, ‘The Best Years of Our Live’, ‘The Shawshank Redemption’), Television (Ken Burns Civil War, Bilko, Seinfeld, Breaking Bad, The Wire, Twilight Zone), literature (‘The Saturday Evening Post’, ‘Colliers’, ‘The New Yorker’) artist (Norman Rockwell, Edward Hopper, ect) and in so many ways, it’s been a hotbed of creativity that archived from the mid 19th century to the present, a vibrant life like few others. Perhaps because your constitution allowed individuality to flourish, whereas, most of the British were living a lives of grinding poverty and only the middle classes would aspire to the arts.
Thirdly, I think that you’d find many beautiful English women but they would have to be, generally speaking, outside of London. In the City, it’s normally beauties from around the world and mainly Central and Eastern European women. To find the English ones, you’d have to go to places like Liverpool and Manchester. The big regional cities. Two weeks ago I went to Manchester to watch my football club for the first time after a 5 hour journey and on the Saturday before Sunday’s kick-off, I hit loads of bars, and would have thought the place didn’t have any hot or beautiful girls. That is until I asked a doorman, what the best place was and walked into a place heaving with beauties.
As for the poor skin, a Westernised American diet, lack of sunshine and pollution would do that.
I disagree with a lot of your relationship stuff but you are spot on here with this article. As someone with a British business partner and experience in GB I believe you are correct.
Most women in GB are pale and unattractive but Kelly Brook is as close to perfection as any American girl. It’s a left wing country but the nationalists like Farage and Vance are people we need here. Brexit was a huge win for the country but Muslims will still slowly kill it off.
Let’s hope Trump can win here or we are on the same path. GB is our father and we are following their path to destruction but there are still pockets of nationalist leaders who want our past greatness not to go away so easily.
I’ll take a hot British chick with bad teeth over a similarly attractive American one any day no matter how bad her skin is because unlike us, she does not get enough vitamin D.
That being said, there is no better place to be than the USA. We just need to be willing to move around a bit to get away from the places liberalism is destroying
Good post Dragon
Is this an “ends justify the means” statement ? The only way I could admire the British Empire would be the same way I might admire Genghis Khan, the Roman Empire, or admiral Dönitz while we’re at it: I can acknowledge the brilliance/badassery and even the admittedly positive influence on the world, but not condone the means and especially not the ridiculous worldview/mentality behind it. The Empire was demonized because people were growing morally uncomfortable with, you know, colonizing other countries and calling oneself the superior christian civilizer of the savages. It doesn’t matter one bit that British expansionism retrospectively turns out to have made the world a better place than if it hadn’t happened: intent and ideology are what matters, and the intent and ideology where: make the world England by whatever means (including things no less horrible than human sacrifice).
Of course once that is said I don’t have the all too common idiocy of concluding that British people of today are worth hating, otherwise I’d be as stupid as a feminist who thinks men owe women something for what men of the past did to women of the past: more essentializing of a human group to justify hatred. I have no quarrel whatsoever with a random Briton.
You have it backwards. I don’t have a romanticized view. Society has a jaundiced view (which you partially mentioned).
I’m a libertarian. All empires are indeed evil, period. But modern day society paints the British Empire as pure evil, and the cause of just about every world problem today. Yeah, it caused many problems. It also created a lot of good. As an objective viewer of history, I must acknowledge both, not cherry-pick one or the other.
American’s cultural contributions are great, but I still think that on balance, cultures like England and China still “win” when compared to the USA in terms of cultural value. (Seinfeld? The New Yorker? Breaking Bad? Really?)
Entirely possible, but as I’ve already stated twice, this post is not about England. It’s about London.
I know guys like you hate to hear this, but the USA is on the same path even if Trump wins.
Haha, and that place to get away from…is the USA. 🙂
Liberalism (and right-wing corporatists) have already destroyed the USA, in that we are now past the point of no return, past the point of fixing the overall system.
Thanks dude.
No.
As I said above, there’s good and there’s bad, and I admire the good while acknowledging the bad. I deeply admire the Roman Empire and the empire of Genghis Khan for the good they did. (I do not admire Dönitz, nor any other Nazi, and it’s stupid to include him in such a discussion.) I hate both empires for the bad they did.
See, unlike most people, I’m objective about these things and don’t let my personal feelings or biases influence my views on historical events. (Or at least I try to.)
18th-19th century Christian civilization was superior (not perfect, but superior) to many of the barbaric cultures it encountered; cultures that engaged in brutalization of women, human sacrifice, etc, etc. This is one of the few issues where I side with the right-wingers. As un-PC as it sounds, some cultures are indeed better than others.
“If you’re an American as I am, England is your father too, regardless of your racial nationality.”
What a crock. If you’re a black American, Native American etc England is not your father. He is the villian who killed your real father, raped your mother, and forced you to call him Daddy until you grew up and knew better.
That’s still your father.
Per the discussion we’re having above in the comments, I never said he was a good father. I just said he’s your father.
Yes I fully agree with that one.
I deliberately added Dönitz because he was a brilliant military mind. As shocking as it may sound, I don’t understand why nearly everyone sets nazism apart ideologically (I’d say it beats most of the rest in degree of evil, but isn’t another “type” of evil). As an ex-muslim, I fully agree that islam has massive similarities with nazism, and that neither has any right to be “respected” as PC would have us do, but that doesn’t prevent me from admiring quite a few muslim figures such as Avicenna and others. Dönitz was brilliant, Von Manstein who devised the plan for the invasion of France was brilliant, both were Nazis. If you can admire Genghis Khan, a dude with a death toll of tens of millions in a time when that was equivalent to nearly a billion today, but can’t by principle admire a Nazi general, then your moral priorities are way too skewed by emotional hangup on a word, “nazism”. How is a man who had enough disregard for human life to do what Genghis Khan did (on top of having raped so many women that any Chinese person has a decent chance of being his descendant) somehow less guilty, just because he didn’t hold a specific ideology with a well-known name that spurred his actions ? A monster driven by personal impulses or by an ideology is a monster either way, so I say admire both (when there’s something to admire) or exclude both.
NB: I realize this is getting off-topic so I’d understand if you leave it here.
@Neil:
Political Correctness detected. Employing red pill countermeasures now:
Wow! That’s a lot of different shit to lump together dude! How about we break down each:
1. Racism – the belief that your biological race is inherently superior to other genetic races just by virtue of your DNA/blood/breeding.
2. Nationalism – an excessive form of patriotism leading to a fanatical devotion to one’s nation and culture above other nations and cultures.
3. Subtle Prejudice – Um……yeah……that’s part of the human condition which will always exist on a subconscious level that’s really not even worth mentioning or feeling guilty about.
4. Ingrained anti-foreign mindset – heh, heh, heh. I believe you’re now describing “culturalism,” which is a belief I wholeheartedly subscribe to. Every nation is a “culture made political.” You introduce “multiculturalism,” and you’re really introducing “multi-countries.” When this happens, your country is no longer a country, but rather a homeless shelter for every other country. When every country becomes a homeless shelter for every other country, all countries become the same. When they become the same, there is no more philosophical argument against the abolition of countries and the establishment of a totalitarian one world government. So…..yeah, an “ingrained anti-foreign mindset” is cultural self-protection against inferior cultures.
If members of different races share the same culture, they will hang out together, have sex with each other, and consider themselves one united people. Since racism is completely irrational and absurd, this intermixing is a good thing. But we must not confuse race with culture. Britain is a smaller nation that is better at cultural assimilation (or at least it was before it became Britistan), in contrast to America with its multiculturalism garbage!
Racial diversity is perfectly fine. But you can’t have “cultural diversity,” as different cultures have fundamentally different personalities that are incompatible with each other.
Most of those police shootings were perfectly justified. You shouldn’t allow yourself to be brainwashed by black supremacist propaganda or other types of anti-white racism.
Once again, you’re conflating racism with culturalism. All nations need to assimilate their immigrants into their culture, regardless of the race or skin color of those immigrants. If you don’t, then you don’t have a country anymore, thus paving the way for a gigantic global government that will enslave us all.
Without “fellow feeling,” as it were, all mediating cultural institutions between the individual and government are eradicated, thus allowing the government to be let loose on the individual in order to control the cultural chaos via a totalitarian system (which is the plan of the elites).
The Brits should have an “anti-foreign” feeling towards the Muslims. Muslims are extremely dangerous people who reject cultural assimilation and seek world domination, as per the instructions of their Prophet (may pig vomit be upon him). If Brexit was an anti-Muslim initiative, assimilated Brits of all races and colors should be legitimately proud of themselves.
There is no such thing as a “hate crime.” You are now speaking like the SJW thought police. A crime is a crime. Period.
Because it isn’t. Western culture is, in the most literal sense, the most anti-racist culture in the history of human civilization. Show me any culture outside the West that agrees to take in so many different races and immigrants.
Western culture is also, in the most literal sense, vastly superior to all other cultures in the history of human civilization, by literally any measure you can think of (freedom, democracy, the enlightenment, free speech, separation of church and state, sexual freedom, science, technology, medicine, etc…). Show me any culture that has the West beat on anything, including your pet peeves, like racism, sexism, etc… Compared to the East, we are the least racist, least sexist, least homophobic, and most tolerant society that has ever been created.
So when a bunch of Muslims swarm into Europe who reject western values, reject the enlightenment, reject Free Speech, reject the separation of religion and government, reject sexual freedom, reject democracy, and reject everything that makes our western culture superior to the third world dictatorial toilets they came from, and seek to replace these things with sexism, homophobia, sexual repression, and absolute tyranny, not only should you be in favor of Brexit, but also call for mass deportations of these Muslim foreigners as a legitimate way of taking out the regressive trash, thus preserving western freedom and our cultural superiority.
No, it’s not as bad. America has problems with racism, but nowhere near the amounts of problems as Japan or any country outside the West has!
It’s not 100 or 0. Degree matters. Stop being so bipolar.
“Seinfeld? The New Yorker? Breaking Bad? Really?)”
Well, ‘The New Yorker’ is liberal and that doesn’t run with my Libertarian outlook, but it did run during it’s heyday, some of the greatest short fiction ever published by the likes of Ray Bradbury and the cartoons of Charles Addams.
‘Seinfeld’ I see as the comedy descendant of Buster Keaton, Ernst Lubitsch, Billy Wilder and Nat Hiken’s immortal ‘Sgt. Bilko’, ie, a philosophically slanted comic outlook on life. There’s a reason segments like ‘The Contest’ & ‘The Opposite’ are so popular with the PUA community.
I wonder what Blackdragon watches on downtime?
Have the articles about other countries/cities had comments this heated?
I thought this was a really informative article, London seems to be an incredibly divisive city. I’ve heard opinions ranging from “it’s the best city on earth” to “it’s a shithole”. So it was cool reading, what I thought was, a fairly balanced review of the city. I’ve found your reviews of Melbourne and Sydney to be spot on.
Also had a laugh about the broken machines in cabs. Before I started solely using uber, I used to get that all the time from cabbies in Australia. Until you tell them you’ve got no cash, suddenly it magically starts working.
@Jack Outside the Box Jeez, take a chill pill, mate.
Blackdragon hardly ever watches TV because he’s too busy enjoying his wonderful life. And TV sucks.
I haven’t watched any TV since April or so, except for a few episodes of Battlestar Galactica and Stranger Things with my daughter.
In my downtime I read fantasy fiction, or watch news clips or action movies.
Yes. A few folks got pissed off in the Australia article. A few guys got a little defensive in the New York article if I recall correctly.
It’s strictly an issue of readership size. If I say bad things about Singapore, for example, I’m not going to get a lot of backlash since I don’t have a lot of readers there. But if I state the negatives of a big Western English-speaking city where I have a lot of readers, then yeah, I’m going to get more irrational angry dudes who don’t want to hear anything negative about where they live. (And again you guys, I think my country sucks so badly that I’m leaving it forever in a few years.)
That’s describes every major city, not just London. Read this.
Thank you. I always make sure to be as balanced and objective about describing every city I spend time in.
Yes, it’s hugely irritating. As I mentioned when I reviewed New York, if you try to pay for a taxi with a card there, they don’t lie, they just get really pissed off and start bitching at you.
It is the stupidest, most needless problem I’ve ever seen in the business world. As I’ve been saying to business owners for 25 years in my consulting practice, if you don’t like paying credit card fees, just fucking raise your prices 3% to cover the transaction charges. Or add a 3% surcharge for any credit card orders. But for fuck’s sake, don’t lie to the customer or get angry at the customer because he wants to pay in a more convenient way than cash. Idiotic.
Never got these left-wingers who demonize old western empires…just look at what you get if you don’t have at least some western/judaic-christian influence on your country (cough, islam, cough).
Also I don’t see why there’s still Rousseau’s “noble savage” theory floating around on blogs like these. Thank god those dudes where colonized and stopped to kill each other with stone cut axes/knives, or sacrificing their keen to the sun/moon/animal god. Of course I don’t endorse the bloodshed they suffered (which was not nearly bad as left-wing education wants us to believe), but what was the alternative? Raise a fence and live side-by-side being forever raided by them?
People forget that colonization is part of the human nature and history….of all the empires raised in the west, the British was clearly the most “local friendly” of them all (not nearly perfect, but way better than Rome, Portugal and Spain I dare say).
The savages were a continent away. Muslims were pushed back and declining by the 17th century (I get shivers when I imagine what would’ve happened if the Turks hadn’t been stopped at Vienne, and/or if the Arabs hadn’t been stopped in southern France. The whole world could be a gigantic Saudi Arabia today); but as for all the other “savages”, it took crossing oceans and continents to get to them. This is conquest pure and simple, not self-defense.
You’re oversimplifying things POB. It isn’t a black-and-white either/or between the leftist lies and the right-wing narrative. People have this irritating habit of swinging way too easily in their opinions, as in “alright, turns out the leftists have an agenda, so they must be 100% lying to us about everything”. Same with things like global warming, “it seems to strengthen the case for big gov, therefore it must be a hoax” – hell, Penn Jillette has changed his mind about it and now finds it more likely to be true than not. It’s not just leftists who are being irrational hotheads about this.
Any large phenomenon can be rightly interpreted as a “natural part of human history”, doesn’t give us the right to retrospectively declare it “good” in the moral sense. An eruption that kills thousands can lead to extremely fertile fields later on, but the eruption itself was still a very bad thing that happens just for its own sake.
Edit to my last comment to BD: to make things more consistent, just replace Avicenna with Khalid Ibn al Walid. Now we have a much closer parallel between islam and nazism (Khalid and Dönitz/Manstein). Ibn al Walid, representing an ideology that was aiming at conquering the world and claimed that most humans are deserving of eternal torture by its god, can easily be argued to be as “bad” as any nazi general, and yet on the other hand he forces admiration as one of the greatest generals in history (widely recognized). There is no coherent way you could, on moral grounds, exclude nazis from ‘admiration’ while not excluding a Ghenghis or a Khalid. Just let go of the whole nazism-is-different misconception. Yes, some “cultures” are better than others, but the grading we traditionally have almost by default is ridiculously flawed. The god of christianity – and therefore the authors of the bible – believe that miscreants (tens of billions of people from prehistory upward) deserve to burn forever, and by the crudest quantitative estimate, that makes him/them way worse than Hitler. It’s just that we’ve gotten used to ideologies more conspicuous about their evilness. Nazism is just an offshoot of a racism that was common and accepted 200 y ago, which just managed to survive to the 20th when it was no longer widely accepted, and so it was artificially singled out as an evil that stands apart.
I always thought that Brits were far superior to Americans — smarter, more educated, less hubristic and generally idiotic than we are. Until I actually went to London. Nothing ever made me prouder to be an American. Honestly, going there was the one thing that made me feel patriotic for the first time in my life.
Yes, British people are very, very nice and friendly and their social skills are vastly superior to ours. They are also probably smarter, as a group. They are certainly wittier and better conversationalists by far. Their accents sound much better than either Americans or Canadians.
But Americans are way cooler. Just…sorry but they are.
Basically it seemed to me that all of the physically vigorous, strapping, aggressive British men migrated to the US and Australia 200 years ago (or were run out of the UK), while the more mild-mannered, physically weak, socially cooperative, passive British guys stayed in the UK. And now after several generations you can still see a clear difference. The British men, as a group, are WAY smaller and skinnier than Americans, Australians, or Canadians. It’s actually jarring. None of them have any muscles and they all look like their girlfriends could beat them up. I really mean that, most of the male-female couples I saw looked like they weighed about the same amount. There is more sexual di-morphism in the US, where men aspire to look more masculine and the women more feminine.
I thought the British women looked pretty similar to American women but you don’t see as many extremes, and I agree with BD that I don’t recall seeing more than a small handful of actually “hot” women even though London is terribly crowded and I saw tons of people. But compared to the US, there were no super in shape Brits, no super hot Brits, but also no super obese or super ugly Brits. In the US we have more extremes. I was in London for a full week and I don’t recall seeing more than about 5 men I thought were attractive, where I easily see that many in one day in my city which has only a fraction of the population.
Though again, the Londoners are also smarter, wittier, funnier, and more pleasant to converse with. So not trying to dis them. But it’s just jarring when you’re used to a more “macho” presentation of men in the US, to see all these 130-lb guys running around dressed like hipsters. They do have lovely accents though.
@Kryptokate You seemed to be expecting UK guys to be some sort of Viking race!? We never were. I don’t think five days in one city can compare to a lifetime of living in a whole country, in terms of generalizations of a country and it’s people; you really have to live there.
Thinking that your cool based on the fact that you are more muscular is kind of a limited mind-set. It’s like me saying “Oh, British guys are so much cooler than Americans as we can hold conversations on so many topics, not just beer & the NFL!”
Europeans generally are going to be smaller than North Americans due to economic & cultural reasons. British kids (as well as Spanish & Italians) grow up wanting to be football players, where speed and foot control is key.
American kids grow up wanting to be American Football players where size is a pre-requisite. This is why every high school gym has a weights room; in the UK no schools have them, only once you go to college or University.
Coupled with the larger meals that are consumed in the US and you have generations of guys who are bigger and who genetically will have kids who will grow up bigger. This also explains why the obesity level is so high as guys who stop playing sports or exercise, still consume excessive calories. When I was living in the states, I often chatted to guys in the gym who wanted to get back in shape. Their stories were generally the same ‘played football in school/college/semi-pro, got injury and/or job, had kids, was busy, still ate loads. Woke up and saw the mirror!’
Trying to see your country in every other place you go, will always let you down. Embrace the fact that we’re all different and accept that every place has it’s joys & disappointments.
@ Neil Hey, I have zero interest in the NFL or any other sport for that matter. I much prefer someone who can hold an interesting conversation to some boring person who only cares about sports. Like I said, I’m not trying to dis anyone or have a “who’s better” contest, just noting the broad differences. I’ve never been a big pro-USA person, but traveling to other places actually makes me appreciate it more here. When I got home and walked back into my house it felt like a spacious palatial mansion compared to the cramped quarters in London. 😉
My British hosts made the same argument about people in Europe not wanting to be muscular because soccer/”football” favors lighter bodytypes. I don’t know, maybe. It’s not like everyone here plays American football. People play lots of different sports here (and plenty play none). I think the reason people have muscles here is because they go to the gym to get muscles to look better, not for sports. Most people that lift do it for vanity more than athletics. Americans just go to extremes with everything.
I didn’t mean to say that Americans are cooler because of their muscles (which let’s be clear, not all Americans have, not at all). I actually meant we’re cooler for other reasons but it’s more complicated. Lets just say that no other country would have a Beyonce, and leave it at that.
Here’s a positive note: any guy who is British or Australian has an automatic huge advantage in getting laid in the US because of the accent. Girls LOOOOOOVE British/Aussie/New Zealand accents. It’s like a five-fold advantage. Any Brit who can’t get laid in the US has serious problems. That goes double for Aussies, every chick I know is ready to drop her pants at just the hypothetical idea of an Australian guy. If a guy is tall AND Aussie then he could be homeless and still get basically any US chick he wanted. That WolfofGeorgeStreet guy is always talking about different markets but I think the reason he perceives the US as being so favorable is because he’s Aussie and therefore has an enormous advantage over American guys if he’s trying to meet women in the US. I’m sort of surprised that guys don’t fake accents more often as a get-laid strategy bc girls love them so much.
Sadly, it doesn’t help the Canadian guys because it just sounds goofy to American ears. And speaking of that, I don’t know how guys from UK/Aus/NZ can stand to listen to American accents, we sound terrible in comparison.
Neil, your comment to Kate is exactly what I’m talking about. You didn’t actually refute anything she said. Instead you just got upset, defensive, and tried to shift the topic to her culture.
If people say Americans are fat or shallow, for example, I reply, “Yep. They are. It’s a serious problem in our culture.” I don’t get pissed off and say, “Well wait a minute! People in YOUR country <insert negative thing here>!!!!”
We all need to be a little more accepting of our own culture’s flaws or differences. I’m accepting of mine.
Official Update to the Above Article
More London Infrastructure Problems
After a long journey through Italy, Sicily, and France, my mom and I had to return to London for just one evening, to spend the night and get back on a plane headed back for the USA. We were only in London a few hours outside of our sleeping time. What could go wrong in just a few hours?
A lot
– After getting off the plane from France, we go to the hotel shuttle section. After waiting 25 minutes for the shuttle to take us to our hotel, the shuttle arrives. It’s on time. I’m happy. We drag our bags onto the shuttle and are told we need to pay 10 pounds as a fee. I was told by the hotel when I booked the room the airport shuttle was complimentary. Free. They lied.
Well, that’s bullshit, but I roll with the punches. Its only 10 pounds.
All we had were Euros, not pounds. Could he take Euros? No. An international airport shuttle in England won’t take Euros?
Okay, can you take a credit card? No.
Fucking London. We angrily drag our bags off the shuttle, and walk all the way over to the taxi section to get a taxi. The taxi stand lady asks if we have pounds. We don’t. We only have Euros. We didn’t expect to need any pounds for our free hotel shuttle that wasn’t free. She says the taxis only take pounds. No problem, we have credit cards. She frowns and says, “Oh, well, I will try to find a taxi that can take credit cards, but it may prove to be a problem.”
Fuck. Once again, these fucking taxis don’t take credit cards (or say they don’t). The woman asks several taxis in a row if they take cards. They all say no. (And yeah, they could be lying, which is worse.)
After the fifth taxi in row, I tell my mom to watch our bags while I go all the way back into the airport to either convert our Euros to pounds for no reason (since we’re literally leaving London for the US first thing tomorrow morning), or find an ATM to withdraw pounds.
I get into the airport, find the currency converter desk, and hand them my Euros. They say they’re closed, even though there are three people standing behind the desk, just standing there, doing nothing except engaging in small talk with each other. I need to walk all the way down the terminal to the other currency desk, they say.
I do so, convert my Euros to pounds for no reason, pay fees to do so, and walk all the way back to the taxi area. When we finally get in the taxi, I see in bright letters inside the car, “Use your credit card to pay for your taxi!” with a credit card reader.
– After all that bullshit, we get into the hotel and check in. At this point I’m worried they won’t have our reservation, but thank god, they do. It’s about 11pm and I’m hungry since I haven’t eaten since lunch (we’ve been traveling since then). While my mom goes up to the hotel room, I go to the hotel restaurant to get us some food. I say to the Eastern European lady behind the bar, and I quote, “Can I get some food to take up to my hotel room? Take away?” I make sure to say “take away” since that’s what they say in London instead of “take out” or “to go.”
She clearly says, “Yes.” So I order some food; a big chicken salad for me, a small salad for my mom, and a cheese plate for us to share, and some bottled water. She tells me to have a seat and they’ll bring it out to me. I say again, and I quote, “That’s take away, right? To take up to my room, not to eat here.” She clearly says, “Yes.”
I wait. And wait. And wait.
Finally, a Middle Eastern waiter brings out our food. It’s on plates, to be eaten in the restaurant. I sigh and say, “I ordered that take away, to take up to my room.”
The waiter looks at me like I’m speaking a foreign language, with this completely confused look on his face. “Take away?” he asks. “Yes,” I say. “All of this?” he asks. “Yes,” I answer, trying not to murder him. He says okay and leaves.
Fifteen fucking minutes later, just before I get up to ask the staff why it’s taking this long to throw my food into a fucking box, the waiter returns, with two other waiters, all of them holding about seven little tiny styrofoam containers (the kind that can hold a single small hamburger) that one guy can’t carry since there are too many. One of them was too small for my salad so they clumsily wrapped the damn thing in plastic wrap half closed.
“Take away,” he says.
“How can I carry all of that up to my room?” I say, staring at it all. All I get in response are blank stares. “Do you have any bags?” I ask, trying not to murder all of them, which is getting difficult at this point. They say no, and keep looking at me like they’ve never done a take out order in the history of this restaurant (which might actually be the case, based on how they were acting). I tell them thank you and angrily wave them away.
I walk over to the restaurant desk, grab two menus (which were made of a hard cardboard), slapped them against each other, go back to my table, and carefully load up my tiny plastic containers onto them, balancing them as best I can, and go all the way up to my hotel room (trying my best to use my card key with the elevator and the room with all this crap in my hands), and me and my mom eat our now cold, soggy food.
– At the airport lounge the next day, the “fancy” one I paid extra for so my elderly mother could rest a little before our flight, there was a blaring, loud beeping noise coming from the kitchen. BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! It was so loud it echoed throughout the entire lounge.
I wear noise cancelling headphones while I work on my laptop, so this kind of thing doesn’t affect me, but my mom wasn’t so lucky (and didn’t want to wear my headphones). My mom asked them when it would be shut off and we were told “someone was working on it”. It was beeping the entire time we were there.
Ah, Europe.
Read my reply again BD.
I only used the negative stereotype of beer & NFL (both of which I love BTW) as an example to highlight how picking in a country’s ‘so called’ failings is negative belief.
Kate said how cool she felt Americans were after visiting London. She’s entitled to that belief but on what basis?
She then went straight into a statement about how British guys are less muscular than she thought & how skinny they all are.
Hence my reply, which as she hadn’t given a reason, was naturally was based on the understanding that to her being ‘cool’ was having muscular guys in a country.
As you saw, she replied to my post saying it was due to something that she didn’t want to mention here.
That’s fine but if that’s the case, then you shouldn’t make a generalization in a post but not give a specific reasons to support it, as people will make their own assumptions based on the following comments by the poster.
I pointed out how the different cultural needs of sports lead to differing development of the younger population.
Mentioning how people will put on weight if they consume large quantities of food but don’t exercise enough, isn’t a criticism, it’s a fact.
Is it happening all over the Western world, yes but my reply was to specific guys who played football, but when they stopped, their weight ballooned due to the amount of food they ate.
Hi BD,
I just popped in to say that I agree with almost everything you said about London.
Lived in London for a good 25 years or so. In my opinion, career-wise it is a great place to live. PUA / socially, I found it a lot tougher.
Transport is terrible, women are on average harder to approach than in other cities I have been to and successive Socialist/leftist leaning governments continue to erode the nation by not tackling uncontrolled mass immigration.
Bring back the Empire I say!
– Heretic
Looking forward to reading your posts about Italy–Sicily in particular.
@Gil
Never said it weren’t. I’m talking about guys who were already there after the first batch of colonies were established (like more or less 200 years after the first expeditions). These dudes had to defend themselves, pure and simple.
Also compare what the English did on the US (founded more or less self-sufficient towns and encouraged production and trade) with what the Portuguese an Spanish did with the rest of the continent (very poor infrastructure, small towns made of a bunch of ex-cons just for the sake of exploration of gold and silver).
Of course I am. This is a comment on a blog, not an academic essay.
Man, please, stop with the strawmanning, It’s really annoying. Thanks.
I said you were oversimplifying things because, based on this:
…you were presenting a simplistic dichotomy: let yourself be killed or raise a fence; when the thing to do was to not invade in the first place. I didn’t assume you were talking about the later generations that were already in place.
You’re hardly in a position to call me out on a strawman since it was a response to another fallacy:
that is, presenting the historical account of the “bloodshed” as leftist propaganda when it’s recorded in much more ideologically diverse sources, including old colonial ones. Easy dismissal of a claim by sticking “leftist lie” on it deserves to be ridiculed.
Same with what I said about the “natural part of history” bit: it was a poor argument on your part, and rejecting a poor argument is bound to look like a strawman.
Wow! After hearing the above I would rather spend my vacations in the US or Mexico. I am an American living in Japan. On the other hand, with so many hot women here in Tokyo, why even leave?