I know you feel I rail against my lot rather too frequently, so you may be surprised to hear that the other day I found contentment in the most trying of circumstances. I havn’t told you a story for a while so if you are sitting comfortably here goes.
My commute had been a shocker even by the standards of a Monday morning. I arrived at the station to find that a points failure meant there were no trains running or scheduled to do so for another few hours. Yes, I’ll admit it. For a fleeting moment, standing there on the platform in the cold and dark and a hint of drizzle in the air, I thought of retiring home to bed, but being the dedicated soul I am, I got back in the car and drove all the way down the M11 to the outskirts of London where I took a tube into the City arriving at the office just a few minutes later than normal. Go me.
After the start to the week I’d had and having put in a decent days work I felt I was owed a prompt departure that evening. Anyway I had a 7pm appointment in Newmarket with the Real Tennis pro. So I snuck away just before 5pm and made it down to the Central Lone only to find that some so and so had fallen under a train and the line was closed indefinitely. Swearing gently at this further misfortune I pulled myself together and by way of the DLR, requiring a detour south to Canada Wharf, I eventually arrived in Stratford where I found a few other people had had the same idea. I knew immediately that the taxi ride I had been banking on was a pipe dream. Six miles lay between me and my car which I had left at Redbridge station. Now I don’t know about you, but I rarely set foot east of Bishopsgate. So I don’t mean to be rude when I say this, but I wasn’t at my most confident when I concluded that there was nothing for it other than head out into the night and tromp my way through this less than salubrious part of London. Reassuringly a policeman pointed me in the general direction and I set off, nerves a-jangling, at a decent and concerted lick, albeit with frequent glances around me both for security purposes and in the forlorn hope that an unoccupied taxi would miraculously pop up.
About fifteen minutes later I had pretty much given up hope of a lift and I’ll tell you I was beginning to regret that impulsive streak in me. The side-roads to the right, which I knew I was going to have to negotiate at some point on my way towards the Wanstead Flats, another foreboding obstacle between me and my car, were getting darker and more ominous. And then suddenly an Indian guy walking alongside spoke to me. Obviously sensing my predicament he helpfully pointed out that there was a taxi firm’s offices located on the other side of the road. A good idea indeed I thought and very nice of him. But then he paused to ponder further upon my plight and told me he had a mate who was a taxi driver offering to call him for me. It seemed churlish to decline. He dialled a number and had an unintelligible conversation after which he suggested it would be easiest if I followed him to where his friend was rather than risk the taxi getting snarled up in all the traffic. Just five minutes away. In for a penny in for a pound thought and we strolled on together down Leytonstone High Road. He was a livewire for sure, but we had a nice chat. I banged on about the trials and tribulations of commuting daily from Newmarket and he told me all about his legal processing business. That’s serving writs to you and I. We were having such a high old time I was a bit sad to say goodbye to him when we arrived at the appointed location. There indeed, Eve Road I think, for the record, parked behind a portacabin, was his friend in what might have been a licenced cab though I can’t say I looked particularly closely.
Easing into the back seat I was chuffed with myself that I had the presence of mind to ask him how much it would cost – no flies on me eh? We agreed on £20 and off we pootled. Well didn’t I just have another great conversation with this fellow too. We discussed his friend who had introduced us. “My mate’s English. He was born here, but I’m Indian” he told me. He’d lived in England for 23 years and insisted he loved it. It was home. But he was born in Mumbai only leaving when he was 19 and that’s where his heart was. Gosh we covered a bit of ground he and I. Let me see. We talked about the Indian diaspora, Bolton ( he arrived there from India and, would you believe it, my family lived for three years a while back ) , Zambia ( where his brothers ran an electronic goods shop ), the Chinese in Africa, Brexit ( briefly ), the restaurants of Leytonstone from where we went on to discuss the importance of exercise given unhealthy diets and sedentary lifestyles such as taxi-driving and stockbroking. He agreed with me on this and whilst he was somewhat in awe of the fact that I had had set out with the intention of walking six miles he claimed that, remarkably, the last minute call up to drive me to Redbridge had interrupted him in his resolve to do 20 minutes on the treadmill that evening, the first such work-out he would have had in ages. I was wracked with guilt needless to say. Of course we then had a long chat about sport in general and specifically India’s most popular activities. Cricket, obviously, hockey, squash and table tennis. Table tennis?? It was when I heard myself telling him, whilst I didn’t like to boast, that I was really excellent at table tennis, probably the sport I was best at, and ambidextrous too, that it struck me this bro-mance was getting pretty weird, but luckily it was that point that we arrived in Redbridge. The 5 miles had taken over half an hour, though they had passed in a flash.
And would you believe it, my NBF refused to take any money from me? Of course I insisted and we agreed he would accept the money on a promise that he would go for that run as soon as he got home. And so we went our separate ways. I had 70 miles to drive back to Gazeley which I negotiated in a happy state of mind indeed. I cared not a jot that my commute that day had taken a combined 5.5 hours, nor that I missed my Real Tennis lesson. Not the most riveting story ever. It’s hard to beat the journey home I had when I met the girl with her bottle of Glenfiddich on the late night train from KX to Cambridge, but those were two super nice guys I’d stumbled across on my East London adventure. And hey, I was back in time to watch Howard’s End. “Only Connect.” That’s what it’s all about isn’t it?
Talking about connecting, a dreadful thing happened this week. We caught up over lunch at El Pastor in Borough Market with some friends we’ve only seen a few times since we were at University together, on one of their occasional visits from Australia. I almost choked on my quesadilla when they announced proudly they were about to become grandparents. Forget East London, this is properly scary.
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