cities

Despite having a hundred pages of a coworker's master's thesis to proof-read, I could not help but be distracted by an article in the Economist comparing London and Paris. I was powerless once I saw the two photographs anchoring the article, showing my favorite view in either city, over the Thames from Tate Modern on one side and across the Seine towards the back of Notre Dame on the other. I remember one December day on my first visit to Paris ten years ago when the warm light of the waning afternoon sun painted the Cathedral in exactly the same soft golden. But why did they pick such a drab picture of the Millennium Bridge? My sister took a better one. She doesn't pick up a camera more than twice a year, but she's got the eye of an artist.

I would have loved to do a mash-up with the article, adding my comments into the text and showing it here, but I have no idea how to do that without running afoul of copyright issues. So I'll just post a few lines with my corresponding thoughts.

"An estimated 200,000 French people now live in London, serving coffee or trading derivatives; waiting lists groan at the Lycée Français in South Kensington." Imperial College is in South Kensington, not far from the Lycée Français, and French are everywhere. However, the baristas in the coffee shops are usually Eastern European.

"These days, there is nothing particularly British about London, bar its tolerance of chaos." It is in fact hard to find Brits. This place is so international and removed from the country whose capital it is that it could really be anywhere. It's a world city.

"London's restaurant pioneers had no gastronomic tradition to uphold." According to tradition, food in England sucks. In reality, food in London rocks. People speak 150 languages here and cook in as many ways. The variety is staggering and the quality often stunning.

"London can afford to be bold with its architecture, since its riverside skyline has none of the unbroken elegance of that of Paris." And yet, there are those who oppose skyscrapers and newfangled spiky glass buildings because of the unique view from Richmond towards St. Paul's, ten miles along the Thames. It's a flat city.

"His Vélib rent-a-bikes, available at 1,450 street corners across the capital, have been a huge hit." Just as they did in Paris, Ken Livingston wants to put for-hire bikes all over London. I'd be happy with a few more bike racks already.

"...it is the world's most expensive city..." Thanks for reminding me ;-) But then again, one gets used to it. It costs what it costs, and if people didn't have the money, they couldn't pay for it.

"The Underground's modernisation project has been a shambles, its financing a fiasco." The Underground's first line opened in 1863 and is still running today. In fact, it was such a success from the beginning that most lines are older than a century. It shows everywhere, and that the whole operation runs at all (and transports three billion people a year) never fails to amaze me. By the way, the financing fiasco of the modernization was due to atrocious management after privatization. No wonder the Economist touches upon this only cursorily.

"... a wave of stabbings and shootings of teenagers in poor areas." The number of kids killed by (and killing with) knives is truly shocking; there's always something in the news. As these incidents are restricted to some shady, no, make this highly dangerous, areas, there is not enough public pressure to tackle the issue seriously.

“When a man is tired of London, he can always go and have a three-star meal in Paris.” Or: If you're sick of the big, bustling city, you can always take the train to Paris for the weekend and relax.