Current tea: PG Tips; Current music: London Calling by The Clash
You know how Katy Perry feels about Friday nights? Well I have the same kind of infatuation with Saturday mornings. Instead of dancing on tables and drinking too much vodka, I dance around my room in cotton pajamas while drinking too much chai. It's the time of the week when my Only Child Syndrome is the strongest. I don't want to talk to anyone; I just want to be left alone with my thoughts, some hot tea, and some good music. Today, my mind is preoccupied with the idea of London. It's the good kind of preoccupation where you just mull through your thoughts at a slow and steady pace. So, I figured I would torture you with the twisted workings of my mind because well…that's why we have the internet.
San Francisco is my home. London is my love-affair. I fell in love with England at the ripe old age of eight when my mom introduced me to the wonders of Enid Blyton. I devoured The Secret Seven and The Famous Five series. Whenever anyone asked me what I wanted for my birthday, the reply would be swift - a Blyton book please. When I moved from India, I packed one suitcase of clothes and one suitcase of books. My dad was wonderful in indulging my bookworm tendencies and never questioned my need to bring all my books with me across the world. My Enid Blyton books were my security blanket. So, even if I was moving so far away to a country where I knew no one and had no idea about how I would fit in, I would be OK as long as I had Julian, Anne, Dick, and George with me. To this day, when I have had a particularly horrendous week, I open up my favorite Famous Five book. Fast forward a few years and I discovered the wonders of Harry Potter. The boy wizard helped me make my first set of friends in America because even though I was the new kid in Sunnyvale Middle School with an accent and two long braids, I could still relate to those around me through my love of Harry Potter. My anglophile tendencies are completely intertwined with my identity as a bookworm, so it's no surprise that the place I wanted to visit the most when I grew up was England.
I got the chance to visit London when I was 24. It was an impromptu trip triggered by one of my best friends saying she was going. I was nervous about the trip. What if it isn't as wonderful as it was in my head? What if I have the worst experience getting around that I leave completely frustrated? There's nothing so disheartening as having a dream get shattered and London was my dream world. So, I went with by bag of doubts and excitement. I loved it. I loved the vibe of the city, the atmosphere, the people, the bustle. I remember standing in the middle of Trafalgar Square on St. Patrick's Day and thinking - "I made it. I actually made it." I wished with all my heart I could spend months in that place. Ever since I got back from that trip, I kept trying to find ways to go back. Maybe I can to graduate school there. Maybe I can go work for the London office. It still remains my dream city, my prince charming when I get disillusioned with my current life, the one place in the world I desperately want to live even for a brief moment in time. Maybe that's what it should remain. A beautiful dream of a city that I can escape to once in a while. After all, we all need a place in the world that is pure fantasy and thrill and London is that for me. The city of my dreams that I feel incredibly lucky to visit and share whenever I get the chance.
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