London Calling

OK, so I was in London last week, right?

Worst… timing… ever!

I was originally intended to get to our main London office on Thursday, meet the IT team and various business contacts and get some training for a new piece of software to be used (surprise!) during emergency situations. I was staying at a hotel about 3 minutes from King’s Cross (map), and the office was right next to Liverpool Station (map). When I left the hotel, with the intention of taking the tube or a bus to get to the office, I noticed the street was teeming with people walking down the road. I asked the hotel clerk what was going on, he said that there’d been a widepsread overload in the tube’s electrical network, and that the underground system had been shut down. This made sense to me, and explained why everybody was walking, so I asked for a map and started towards the office, a 20-ish minute walk. As I walked on, I started noticing that everybody was on their cell phone, so I removed my headphones and tried to make out what the hell was going on. I then saw a trio of crying women running towards me, and heard the magic word:

“Bombs.”

I asked a guard if he knew what was going on, and sure enough, he told me that there’d been six bombs (the first official number) planted on the trains, and one on a double-decker bus. I tried using my cell phone, but the lines were down. Seeing as I was probably closer to the office than to the hotel, I decided the best route to get off the street was to walk whatever was left to the bank. Until I made it to the main street, and saw that it had been cordoned off by lots and lots of police cars. I decided I wasn’t going anywhere near there, and started my way back to the hotel. On the way, I noticed my mobile e-mail was working, unlike my cell phone, so I started e-mailing everybody to let them know I was ok. During the walk back I hit an area with phone coverage, and I called everybody to tell them what had happened, and that I was going back to the hotel. I then took a long shower and settled in front of the TV, watching the news coverage and keeping in touch via my Blackberry.

I could say “Thank god I didn’t take the tube that morning” or whatever, but, to be honest, I never felt like I was in danger, neither during the day of the attack nor during the weekend. I did feel a quite different vibe from the media while watching the coverage. Maybe it was because, in the end, the casualty count isn’t as high as it could’ve been, or even as high as it was in, say, New York or Madrid. Or maybe, one way or the other, we’re getting used to this kind of attack, and we’re slowly accepting the fact that it’s not if, but when.

Trackbacks & Pings

  1. Internet casino gambling bonuses. on 25 Jul 2008 at 8:09 pm

    Internet casino gambling bonuses….

    Internet casino gambling. Internet casino gambling bonuses. Gambling internet casino gambling online. Best casino gambling internet….

  2. Free horse fuck video. on 04 Aug 2008 at 3:30 am

    Horse fuck animal fuckers dog fuck….

    Animal sex dog fuck bestiality porn horse sex free. Horse fuck. Shit crap pee animal sex fuck horse aet shit. Horse fuck zoo personal adds. Horse fuck dog fuck animal fuck. Let s fuck the horse….

Comments

  1. wale wrote:

    we’re getting used to this kind of attack—-discrepo contigo

    Posted 11 Jul 2005 at 6:38 pm

  2. Blind Willie wrote:

    I also disagree. No one gets used to situations like this. I remember this one time in Medellin (booty eden), about three years ago. I was dining at a local restaurant when a very mild detonation occurred. It was obviously nothing to worry about, so I kept enjoying my meal. I was right, it turned out to be a transformer. But the thing is, I recall vividly that the room went silent for a couple of seconds, and you couldn’t cut the tension in the room with an electric saw. Remember, this was only three years ago, which means the the violence that they endured during the Cartel Wars was long gone. I spoke with the people who joined me at table, and it was easy to notice the emotional scars in them.

    I speak for myself, but if I trully ever reach the point of asking myself when will the next attack be, I’d be packing my bag, light, just to avoid carrying an extra weight in my sprint to the airport.

    Posted 11 Jul 2005 at 9:46 pm

  3. alvarete wrote:

    Yes, but where do you run? Not in the sense of “I live in Colombia, and bombings happen here”, but in the sense of “I live in a large city, I know it’s going to hit”. Which large city is left? Paris? Should all its inhabitants flee to the countryside?

    Posted 11 Jul 2005 at 10:03 pm

  4. Blind Willie wrote:

    It’s a whole different issue when “home” is the place we’re talking about. I guess I was just trying to point out that no job is worth keeping if you might become a cassualty.

    Posted 11 Jul 2005 at 10:33 pm

  5. Chase Ransom wrote:

    This could get deeper than we want to go.

    Define cassualty. Define terror. What is so terrible about these attacks? That people die? That they are “inocent” victims? That the deaths are inflicted by “nuts”?

    Dont people die every day? You dont think that every day people die in worse ways than this?

    Today the world has become a planet of pussies, where everybody cries for the most ridiculous reasons. Normally, for self serving purposes such as, adding drama to their lives (which is always a favorite of humanity).

    Wow, we hold vigil and cry and pray for 40 people in a bombing. Front page news all over the world. Really?

    When was the last time you saw on the front page of the paper news of all the death that goes on in Africa? Recently because of the G8 and Live 8? How many vigils and prayers do you think are held each day for the millions of starving undereducated homeless people in South America. How much less terrible is that, versus a car bombing?

    You want horror? You want terror? Read a history book. People faint and cry over the millions of Jews killed during WWII, but not much is ever said of the many, many, many more millions of Russians that died during Lenin’s rule over Russia. Why is that?

    There are those of us who are unimpressed with death and distruction. When I saw the Trade Center fall, I was shocked by the visuals, but unmoved for the people. 3,000 less people on this planet. How terrible is that? Why is it so terrible?

    I’ll admit its sad we cant all get along. Its true that senseless killing is just that, senseless. But we have reached a point where people have a bleeding heart over the most minute things, and blow them into this overhyped, hyperbolic event, that all in all, doesnt have that much significance.

    Who cares that Lady Di is dead? What is this? Everybody wants to feel “touched”. We all want to be involved. Participate in the loss. Give me something to cry about and feel sorry for.

    Bullshit.

    Anyway, enough of my positive attitude. I digress.

    You have to remember, Londoners are hard core. They lived through Nazi bombings, and decades of fighting with the IRA. They have quite a bit of experience with loss and pain, and a handfull of bombs and a couple dozen deaths isnt about to shake the country to its foundation. Here in the USA we are so unaccustomed to foreign violence and are so damn obsessed with being politically correct, that if I got a paper cut tonigh the people in the office next door would probably light a candle and shed a tear. Unfortunately, that kind of attitude is contagious.

    I’ll reserve my political views about this for another time.

    F it.

    Posted 11 Jul 2005 at 10:51 pm

  6. alvarete wrote:

    Everybody wants to relate. In London, what I felt was that people felt inconvenienced, not terrorised. If you want to go Bush, “they didn’t let the tuhrruhruhsts” win. That night, they were out, they were drinking beer, and everybody started their conversations with “pity about the tube, eh?”, but there were no public demonstrations, nobody tried to oust the Prime Minister, and everybody who could make it to the office was back the next day, ready to keep on living. In my opinion, the way it should be.

    Posted 11 Jul 2005 at 11:12 pm

  7. Blind Willie wrote:

    Just in case, I’m not implying Alvarete should get out of London, or that Londoners should be crapping their pants. I made my comments based on Alvarete’s
    hypothetical situation when bombings become almost a daily issue, when you become a sitting duck.

    What’s in discussion here is if it’s truly possible to “getting used to it”. So, your historical facts are correct, Londoners are tough. But as tough as they are, nobody will ever say they were “used to it” back in the 40’s.

    “there are those of us who are unimpressed with death and destruction”. I must say I agree with you, up to a point, that is, until a tragedy reaches you at a personal level.

    “Define casualty, define terror”. I’m pretty much OK with the standard, dictionary’s deffinition of both words. Anyway, if it helps, I only care about them whenever they are related to me.

    Neither any country in Europe, nor the U.S.A. have reached a boiling point, and most likely won’t unless a full scale war suddenly erupts.

    Posted 12 Jul 2005 at 12:14 am

  8. Johann wrote:

    I don´t think people get used to bombs, kidnapings, war, the fucked up financial sistem or seeing with desperate eyes how your country gives up resources in a never ending take all you can take for 9.99 party.
    But you come to expect it.
    I don´t know if it´s feeling truly incapable of changing the way things are, or that one gets tired of trying.
    I know the day will come when i wont be able to leave my home without someone packing infront of me and back at me.
    I have checked how much it is to armor a car, know how to use most available weapons and drive myself out of a blockaed.
    I read the free trade agreement offered to south america in the past few month. Bare witness to the scandal in which Citybank borrowed 250 mill pesos with De la Ruas aproval and paid back 2 month later in a 3 to 1 devaluation scandal. I noticed the agreement in which Brasil and China splited the last remaining indian reserve in Ecuador located smack down the mittle of the rain forest for oil last year.
    Saw the discount for oil go from 4 dollars to 17.
    And have non the less sat iddle doing nothing, because nothing can be done.
    But in all of this i keep working,hoping that maybe some day mules will get checkbooks. For if they do man i´ll get my part.
    Take a few min to check that my friends and family are all ok. Then take pity on how things fair elsewhere.
    And do feel sad for those who had a bad they walking next to a bus that some idiot blew up.
    In the end that is for now all i can do. I hope someday to do more, build schools and help the sick.
    But today all i do is that, know that my limitations are taking care of my own.

    Posted 12 Jul 2005 at 12:18 am

  9. Blind Willie wrote:

    Sorry, a subordinate had the nerve to interrupt me, therefore the last two paragraphs weren’t deleted .

    Posted 12 Jul 2005 at 12:18 am

  10. alvarete wrote:

    I did the honours, Willie. Hope I didn’t touch anything important.

    Posted 12 Jul 2005 at 12:30 am

  11. alvarete wrote:

    I would like to clarify that I am not a “tough” man, even though I play one on TV from time to time. But, given the circumstances, I thought that the most appropriate thing to do was to remain calm and civil, like everybody else. And I’ll take calm and civil over panic in the streets any day of the week. Tragedies will always happen, in the end it depends on how close to home they hit. Like Joe says, you can’t change the world, you can just (maybe) take care of those around you.

    Posted 12 Jul 2005 at 12:35 am

  12. alvarete wrote:

    True story: Next day, I got to the office, and I heard the that an employee that was missing the day before had finally appeared. Turns out he got caught in the subway during the attack, and had to be evacuated. Miraculously, he emerged without a scratch. This same fellow was also caught in the middle of the asian tsunami a couple of months ago, where he also went missing, but came out of it intact.

    I suggested that we should equip this guy with a GPS receiver and broadcast his location to the world so everybody could avoid wherever he went. Nobody laughed, so I guess it’s not a cultural thing: I’m just not funny.

    Posted 12 Jul 2005 at 12:39 am

  13. Chase Ransom wrote:

    That dude rocks. Similarly (I work in construction), we have an employee who is a magnet for falling objects and debris. Just in the course of a week he was NEARLY missed by:
    * Crowbar falling on his head from 16 stories high.
    * About 10 pounds of cement falling on his shoulder
    * About 20 1″ nails landing on his head from again, 16 stories.

    On other jobs he has a respectable record for being a moving target for all kinds of shit falling on him.

    It’s interesting how some pppl are prone to hardhips and although very unfortunate on one side, from a different point of view, they are the luckiest fuckers on earth.

    F it

    Posted 12 Jul 2005 at 2:12 am

  14. Chalito wrote:

    hehehe, I laugh Al…at you, you senseless mofo! No no, it was funny, however you suffered from wrong place and time to impress them with your powerfull human skills.

    Everyone has a lot of good points, I specially liked chase’s comment, so full of sarcasm and rage (dude, i really mean this in a good way) that I felt the need to smash my co-worker’s head to his monitor and scream why!!!
    Then again…I do agree with Al about humanity getting used to tragedies. Heck, during WWII in London, when a bomb struck and people were eating supper, at the begginig they would run to shelters…after a while they barely grabbed the dishes so they won’t break.
    Same here in the 3rd world, when the car robberies (express assaults or kidnapings-when they take you and your car for a few hours, do other crimes and then let you go) started it was on the freking news, people would visit the victims etc…nowadays, It’s so normal that yeas, we do get shocked, but it’s just not a big deal anymore.
    I don’t think we’re there with the terrorist’s attacts, but I just hope we don’t get to the point where it’s nomarl…like in Ireland during the 80’s or even Irak these days where suicide bombs are as normal as screwing a cousin if you’re a redneck.

    I also get angry like Chase about how sensacionalist media (or all media) portray this stories and don’t pay attention to much bigger problems like the one going on in Africa. Things like Live8 can happen and we all feel like shit for all those poor people dying, however, thanks to media, we completely forget about it within a month (just like with Live Aid 20 years ago…until now nowbody remembered the huge problem).

    Yet, to round things up, I do beleive that this kind of tragedies are worthy of all the press they get (tragedies like London, Madrid and 9-11), because even though people will die everyday, this people died cuz someone killed them…it wasn’t their unfortunate surroundigs, it’s was a bunch of mofos who got together, got angry cuz they have to screw goats instead of perfect swedish chicks named Inga and Helga like my buddy Al, and decided to kill a bunch of infidels in the process.

    “All you need is love”-Lennon/McCartney
    “Happiness is a warm gun”-Lennon/McCartney

    you choose

    Posted 12 Jul 2005 at 2:18 am

  15. Chase Ransom wrote:

    Drunk driving kills more people than “terrorism” every year, and those deaths are also inflicted by a person onto innocent victims. I could go on and on.

    Ppl will die at the hands of other ppl as long as ppl exist. It is in our nature and to try and pretend that humans can be more righteous than that, is similar to believing in Santa Clause. I have nothing against wishing it were all better, but to actually believe that it can or will be is dilussional.

    Like I’ve said a million times, humanity sucks. And perhaps the worst examples arent even the most violent ones.

    Now if you will excuse me I have like two million resumes to go through on monster.com. OPEN THE FLOOD GATES! (I am about to encouter more evidence of human stupidity).

    F it

    Posted 12 Jul 2005 at 1:22 pm

  16. Blind Willie wrote:

    “got angry cuz they got to screw goats instead of perfect chicks…”.

    True story: you just reminded me of a peculiar worker in a friend’s cotton plantation*, where we used to play football (soccer for our U.S. readers) every weekend. He was a regular joe, a friendly montubio. After football we used to drank beers with him and other co-workers until late afternoon. The thing is, this guy was a devoted donkey-fucker. I kid you not, he was well known for his antics, up to a point where there was no way in hell anybody will let him near their horses. This guy was married, or at least had a woman to cuddle with, but whenever he was drunk (as only people who work the land can), he indulged himself in this sick ass practice of introducing his penis in a donkey’s vagina. And for what we were told, he didn’t mind an audience neither.

    Can you imagine how hard it must have been for him to convince the mule to get in the mood? From what we were told, the animal, as expected, wasn’t very cooperative from the let go. Anyway (cross my heart), his days as a donkey fucker ended one day when a mule kicked him in the head. According to rural myth, it was a jealous mule.

    Posted 12 Jul 2005 at 5:23 pm

  17. alvarete wrote:

    This guy was a devoted donkey-fucker

    Swear to god, I never thought I’d read those words. Truth is stranger than fiction, indeed.

    Posted 12 Jul 2005 at 8:01 pm

  18. Chalito wrote:

    lol!!! you’re killing me willie!

    Posted 13 Jul 2005 at 12:53 am

  19. wale wrote:

    yo si te creo willie, estas practicas suceden en el campo, diario extra de hecho debe tener alguna de estas historias en sus registros

    Posted 13 Jul 2005 at 5:12 am

  20. Schiz Cum Snake wrote:

    This guy was a devoted donkey-fucker

    Those crazy horny hillbillies. Well, I guess it’s understandable and definitely less undignifying than being a mother-fucker.

    practice of introducing his penis in a donkey’s vagina.

    Well, at least he didn’t fuck filthy holes.

    Posted 13 Jul 2005 at 7:52 am

  21. Johann wrote:

    This guy was a devoted donkey-fucker
    Man this is just not right.
    It does happen, out in the land.
    It somehow has given me a wind of fresh air.
    I will look at my day with hope, knowing that any problem that may come today is nothing against the worries of being kick by a mule while trying some fucked up ridding.

    Posted 13 Jul 2005 at 4:53 pm

  22. alvarete wrote:

    Oh yes, according to my logs, google is finally starting to redirect people looking for “donkey fucking” to my web page. Great job guys!

    Posted 14 Jul 2005 at 10:16 pm

  23. Blind Willie wrote:

    jajaja, sorry mate.

    Posted 15 Jul 2005 at 3:47 am

  24. dorothy hale wrote:

    Well, at least now you have a “war” story to tell your grandchildren…

    I have to say, i’m glad you’re ok;)

    Posted 15 Jul 2005 at 8:16 pm

  25. alvarete wrote:

    “Yes, this one time, google started to redirect donkey fuckers to my blog. It was hilarious, I tell you!”

    Oh, you mean the bomb thing. Tough choice, fundamentalist terrorists and zoophiliacs.

    Posted 15 Jul 2005 at 9:10 pm

  26. Chalito wrote:

    “zoophiliacs”…it’s disturbing that you know of the existance of such a word.

    I think that we should all chip in and buy the domain www.donkeyfucker.com and have it redirect all visitors to this site…think about the marketing opportinities, sky’s the limit mon friend!

    Posted 16 Jul 2005 at 12:39 am

  27. alvarete wrote:

    Come on, did you think, for one second, that that domain wasn’t already taken? Go ahead, click on it.

    I’ll wait.

    Posted 16 Jul 2005 at 5:34 pm

  28. Luis wrote:

    Dude I almost went to london that day (I was already in Sweden and figured why not).

    Pero careverga mandame un mail!

    Adivina quien me ofrecio trbajo? Adivina quien se va a casar?

    -Luis

    Posted 21 Jul 2005 at 9:07 pm

  29. Chalito wrote:

    please Luis….tell us!!!

    Al, r u alive mate?

    Posted 22 Jul 2005 at 12:28 am

  30. alvarete wrote:

    I’m alive, just busy with work and shit. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t NDA’d and could write about it. Some of the shit that goes on at my office is priceless. I mean, Mastercard-commercial priceless…

    Posted 22 Jul 2005 at 12:51 am

  31. Chase Ransom wrote:

    At this rate, you may have a revolution on your hands at this site mon. I hope all this work is leading up to a well deserved vacation.

    Saw Wedding Crashers last weekend and it was hillarious. This weekend I am going to try and see The Island or Bad News Bears. The plot behind the Island is kewl and the chick is hot, and I love Billy Bob Thorton because nobody can deliver lack-luster unenthusiastic lines like him. He’s a genius.

    Cheers

    I mean,….F it

    Posted 22 Jul 2005 at 3:30 am

  32. Chase Ransom wrote:

    Billy Bob Thorton, definitely in my top ten list of famous people I would like to have in a close circle of friends. Now that is an interesting list.

    F it.

    Posted 22 Jul 2005 at 3:31 am

  33. alvarete wrote:

    The Bad News Bears was directed by Richard Linklater of Dazed and Confused fame. Now, if that’s not a reason to watch it STAT, I don’t know what is…

    Posted 22 Jul 2005 at 11:49 am

  34. Luis wrote:

    Alvaro, mandame un mail para mantenerme en contacto para cuando me vaya a blaggarto.

    Posted 22 Jul 2005 at 4:10 pm

  35. cuntingbloke wrote:

    …And I live by the river.

    Posted 06 Sep 2005 at 8:38 pm

  36. alvarete wrote:

    Very clever. I would’ve used the nick “Fancy Lad”, but that’s just me…

    Posted 06 Sep 2005 at 9:20 pm

Post a Comment

Your email is never published nor shared. Required fields are marked *

*

*


« Working Man
The world has gone »