It’s early February and I’m ambling down Portobello Road, clutching a Starbucks cappuccino in one hand and a fist full of shopping bags on the verge of snapping in the other. Did I mention it was a Saturday? Or in other words- the bane of my existence.
Every Saturday, my neighborhood becomes a Mecca for pretentious fashionistas who descend upon the market in search of that elusive “vintage” bargain, followed swiftly by the gaggles of pre-pubescent Italian students intent on photographing everything in sight. Eugh.
Normally I find myself lurking along the side streets in a vain attempt to avoid the crowds at all costs. But in some instances I have to suck it up and face the horror (like when I’m viciously hungover, my kitchen cupboards are bare and all that can save me now is a cup of commercial caffeine goodness).
Naturally, today’s excursion played out as usual. As soon as I’d stepped foot on the Portobello Road, I became trapped behind the dreaded “Browser”. This is a person, sometimes part of a pair, who aren’t from round these parts and hence feel the need to absorb everything in their presence at particularly slow pace. If I desperately try to manoeuvre around them, they will - of course - stop and turn around, thus further preventing me from my destination and irritating me even more.
Then there’s the Ultimate Fan. I have encountered this person many a time on the Portobello Road. This is a person who has seen the movie Notting Hill twenty billion times and have come here in the disillusioned belief that they’ll just happen to bump into Hugh Grant and he’ll fall madly in love with them. Much like the movie really.
 |
| The Shop Which No Longer Exists. Sorry. |
Now I must admit, normally I wouldn’t consider myself a complainer. But there are some things I just can’t get my head around and Saturday on Portobello is just one of them. Here’s a couple of other random atrocities which irk me to the max:
The Adult Child
Kid scare me. Fact. When I look at a child, my brain goes into overdrive and I imagine what they’ll look like when they’re older. When they’re falling about the place or acting the maggot, I don’t see a playful five year-old, I see a short drunk person. So if a child happens to exhibit old-before-their-time syndrome, my brain literally balances on the verge of imploding. This syndrome which I speak of typically appears in two forms. The first is when a small child reveals itself to be some sort of crazy genius. I remember a couple of years back, my seven year-old cousin asking me a question about evolution that I (a) Didn’t know the answer to and (b) To be quite frank, didn’t exactly understand the question to begin with. So I promptly ran away.
The second form of this syndrome is when a child literally looks like an old person, and it isn’t my mind viewing them in their future state. I remember my first encounter of a gang of youths ridden with this disorder. They possessed what my friend so eloquently christened “poverty face”. These were eight year-old kids that lacked the giggly roundness of their peers and instead were stricken with sour faces, furrowed brows and the all-round hardened exterior no child should embody.
I was but an innocent fresher - my first week in Uni - just hanging outside the Student’s Union with some mates downing vodka, as you do. Next thing we know we were set upon by a group of poverty faced kids who attempted to colour in our clothing with high-lighters, knocked over our precious vodka and at one point I was threatened by the ringleader that she was going to “break my fucking necklace”. Yikes.
 |
| Demon Children. Just Imagine Them On Scooters And The Nightmare Is Complete. |
Before I moved to London, my attitude towards scooters was that of indifference. Now I see it as the tool of the devil (That's right kids, I mean you). When I used to work in Hammersmith, every morning I would have to walk past this posh prep school on Holland Park Avenue where kids would wear straw hats and have matching satchels.
I’d be strutting down the footpath, minding my own business, when suddenly I’d hear this whirring noise behind me. I’d turn around, and it’d be like a sequence from a nightmare. Ten, maybe fifteen bright-eyed demon children in matching uniforms flying down the footpath on their multi-coloured scooters, their yummy mummies “ya, ya, ya-ing” behind them. Seriously, never have I seen a bigger craze around (with the exception of Justin Bieber) and it consistently haunts me in my dreams (as does Justin Bieber).
The Santa Hat
On a completely different note, my number one crime against fashion and something that grates on me for the entire month of December- The Santa Hat.
Ok, so I understand if some people wear this stupid floppy cone hat in certain circumstances. For example, carol singing. Fair enough. It’s the people who insist on wearing this hat while going about their daily errands that irritates me to the core. Why, oh why do you insist on wearing it to do you're weekly shop at Tesco? You’re not being “festive” you just look STUPID. Further more, people who wear novelty ANYTHING deserve one serious slap. That’s right, throw out those snowman earrings before I rip them out.
The Public Asshole
Assholes are a day-to-day occurrence. I get that. I accept that. But there's a certain type of asshole that just drives me mad. This asshole likes to eat out. A lot. He eats out so much in fact, that he forgets how to behave in public and starts acting like he’s at home and does whatever he darn well pleases. He takes off his shoes. He clicks his fingers at the waitress. He orders on behalf of his lady friend and insists on feeding her too as if she doesn’t have the mental capacity to perform those tasks on her own. He then mauls the face off her in full view of the entire restaurant, before swiftly deafening his fellow diners with his obnoxious laugh. He leaves a 53p tip.
This is a man who silently requests for saliva soup.
 |
| Enough Said. |
My Clumsiness.
Rounding up my list of complaints comes one of my major traits and the knock off effects it procures: My clumsiness. Because of my inability to judge accurately where I place my feet or swing my arms, I have destroyed numerous items of clothing. From the trousers which I ripped thanks to a spectacular fall on a road where I believe my dignity still remains; to the many white t-shirts I have destroyed with red wines stains, ink blotches and coffee drips, my wardrobe isn’t exactly what you’d describe as impeccable.
I wish I could be graceful, but it’s far too late for me now. If I wasn’t get all that practice in as a child falling about the place (yes I was one of those “short, drunk people” back then) maybe things could have been different.
I blame the santa hat wearing public assholes. Hanging about Portobello. On a Saturday.
