London Viewpoint: Everyone Has a Take on This City and the Majority of Them Are Demonstrably Wrong

A Corrections Column for the Many Strong Opinions Held by People Who Have Visited London Between One and Four Times

The London Viewpoint this week addresses what we are calling the Perspective Crisis: a situation in which everyone — tourists, recent arrivals, long-term expats, northern relatives, New Yorkers with opinions, and people who watched a lot of British television in the nineties and feel this constitutes research — has a fully formed, confidently held take on London that is, upon examination, mostly wrong. We are addressing this as a public service.

The Tourist Viewpoint: Enthusiastic, Limited, Technically Incorrect

Tourists love London in the way you love a very expensive theme park — with enormous enthusiasm for 72 hours and with slightly less enthusiasm by hour 73 when you have realised that the red buses are only charming if you are not trying to get somewhere on one. According to Visit London, the capital receives 30 million international visitors annually. They photograph the Changing of the Guard. They queue for the Tower of London. They eat at chains near major landmarks that no Londoner has visited since a school trip in 2001. They leave having experienced a version of London that was specifically designed for them and bears the same relationship to actual London that a film set bears to an actual street.

The tourist take on London: “It’s so historic and charming but quite expensive and a bit grey.” Accuracy rating: 40%. The grey part is correct.

The Recent Arrival Viewpoint: Maximum Confidence, Minimum Context

The person who has lived in London for six months has, paradoxically, the strongest opinions of anyone. They are either in the euphoric phase — “the energy is absolutely electric, every single day there is something incredible happening, I can’t believe I didn’t move here sooner” — or the devastated phase — “I genuinely did not understand what I was agreeing to financially and emotionally and I need to think.” Both are authentic. Both will be entirely revised by month eighteen when the dust settles and the city becomes simply where you live rather than a concept you are in a relationship with.

The six-month take: “London is the most exciting / exhausting / expensive city in the world.” Accuracy rating: 70%. All three adjectives are correct. The surprise is misplaced.

The New Yorker Viewpoint: Comparative, Unrequested, Structurally Flawed

New Yorkers visiting London will, within 24 hours, tell you that London “reminds them of Manhattan.” This comparison is made in a tone suggesting it is a compliment. It is not entirely clear that it is a compliment. Manhattan and London share: density, expense, and the particular social energy of a place where everyone is working extremely hard at something. They differ in: everything else, including scale, temperament, the relationship with silence, and the correct response to making eye contact with a stranger on public transport (London: none; New York: potentially a ten-minute conversation). The comparison is structurally flawed. Nobody has told the New Yorkers. They continue to make it.

The Long-Term Resident Viewpoint: Correct, Inarticulate, Deeply Held

The person who has lived in London for fifteen or more years has achieved something rare: they have stopped having opinions about London as a concept and simply live in it as a fact. They do not find it exciting or overwhelming. They find it Tuesday. They cannot explain it to outsiders. They do not try very hard. They know the best route, the best time, the best version of every situation the city presents. They have earned this knowledge through repetition and mild suffering and they are not particularly interested in sharing it. This is the highest form of London consciousness and cannot be faked or rushed. Bohiney Magazine’s London Viewpoint column has been collecting incorrect takes about London since 2019 and reports that the supply is, if anything, accelerating.

SOURCE: https://prat.uk