After nearly a decade of living in London, I think its safe to call myself a Londoner now.
I make that rude and fed-up-sounding ‘tsk’ noise as I try to pass people who are walking too slowly in front of me – with the matching aggressive body language and irritated exhalation as I march past.
There’s the ‘don’t mess with me’ face as I walk down the street – to be fair I think I’ve always had that one.
I can also hold my own in the usual rugby scrum to get into the tube as it pulls alongside the platform.
Then there’s the commuter cross. That’s what I call when two or more commuters appear as if they’re set for a head on collision, but without adjusting pace or losing nerve, they glide past each other with precision perfect timing. With a slight hesitation of even half a second, there would be a bashing of arms or catching of feet followed by the domino effect of the commuters behind all crashing into each other. But true London commuters never make such a rookie tourist error.
If you want to see the commuter cross at its glorious ballet-like apex, make a rush hour visit to the interchange at Bank Station where the Waterloo & City Line travelator connects with the commuting tunnel leading from the London Underground gates towards exits 8 & 9. (Stop at the snack bar for one of their giant glazed donuts – I’m pretty sure they’re a million calories and fried in lard.) Its actually almost beautiful, as the dozens of commuters heading to the exits simultaneously diagonally criss-cross paths with the commuters exiting the travelator in the opposite direction – all gliding past each other – rushed but calm.
And then some salesman from Ipswich ploughs in with their wheelie suitcase and screws the whole thing up.
Tsk.
Images borrowed from Railway Technology and Times Live.
Our Little Organic Life 