six months in london
By Hannah Cao
INTRO They only say life is short and to enjoy every bit of it because moments pass no matter how small or signficant and they become speckles of memoriblia, slowly turning into faraway figments of our imagination until at one point they will get blurred out. What remains is what you’ve become. I was at my smallest when I stepped out of Heathrow Airport and leaped into the tube to Liverpool St. at 1:05. At 5:34 I was still awake on coffeine and the loud beating inside my heavy chest. In this city, I learned to open up. I learned to laugh and yell and kick and run and fight for myself. I learned that I knew nothing and at twenty, I was still a child. I learned I lacked perspective and my horizon was the size of half a pea. I learned to let go and be selfish and I learned what it meant to be HOME. I learned that I never truly know who I am and that, constantly, I am becoming. At some point it didn’t matter anymore that I didn’t know. I am always on a journey to become. A part of me is left at Piccadilly. Another part on the Metropolitan Line and another in Brick Lane’s book shop. Many new parts I have picked up and taken with me. And bits will be lost along the way, still. But it doesn’t matter. What remains forever is what I became.
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Chapter 01
Chapter 01
Welcome to London
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Chapter 01
Welcome to London
Sat in a dark hotel room by myself, I looked down from the 10th floor onto lights of the night, knowing I would never be the same again after this place. There was going to be a Before and After and I would always be comparing the two. I fell asleep to the sound of uncertainty and dreamt of someone flicking off the light on a stage. In that moment it felt like the end of a performance but really, it was the beginning of a show.
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Chapter 01
I have never been so anxious about my living situation in my life. Granted, it was a bit easier finding a place in Germany. Staying at hotels and hostels is becoming a little exhausting, considering the fact that I would like a place I can call home for the next six months. I am somewhat paranoid when it comes to belongings so I’d like to find a room to really settle down in. I don’t even expect or hope for much. London is so goddamn expensive, it’s not even funny. But I knew what I was getting myself into. I’m starting my internship later today (I’m nervous as hell, I hope I get along with the other interns) and I’ve got three flat hunting appointments this week. Hopefully by the end of the week, I’ll be somewhat settled in. Is this what it’s like to become an adult? Terrifying. To say the least.
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Chapter 02
Chapter 02
Settling in
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Chapter 02
Strolling through Regent’s Park to pinch myself. I’m here. In London. The city of my dreams, pretty much. Right now it’s cold, but I don’t expect any different. Yet, I sit on this bench and smile to myself. Nobody knows me here, nobody knows about my history, my issues. Everyone else, too. Everyone’s got mystery around them and yet, we greet each other at the fruit stand by Tesco’s like we know each other. It’s how open people are here that I appreciate. I’m used to cold, taken aback, reserved. It’s a totally different story here. And I feel it in the air that feels bigger here; it feels lighter, too.
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Chapter 02
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Chapter 02
I feel so full and empty at the same time. I feel it in my bones, still. I brought it with me, from Germany, from home. The sadness that every so often creeps up inside me and swallows me up. I don’t know who I was trying to kid when I thought I could outrun my problems by moving to a different country. No honey British accent from the guy across the bar will wither my demons. No sweet potato burger in Soho will make me taste life differently... That’s what I thought, at least.
After a while, that changed. I was still sad sometimes, just in a different way. And soon enough, as I learned to live some more – because I can only clutch onto these moments in the Now – I realised that there was no space to be sad anymore. And when I cried, I brushed it off and ran out of the house for a walk. That usually put everything back into perspective. And most of the times I stopped myself from wondering what the right perspective was supposed to be.
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Chapter 02
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Chapter 02
I have spent each and every day making the most of ... everything. It’s both exciting and terrifying to have a deadline of six months to explore the most I can in this wonderful city. I feel like I learn something new about it every day and even if I was living here for good, I’d never stop learning, discovering, falling head over heels. Even reading books I already know by heart here in London feels like a whole different experience. Strolling through central places at night isn’t scary at all, it’s so lively at any time of the day and strangers don’t feel like strangers for some reason. I take for granted each possibility I come across at almost every crossroad. I take for granted the great food I can taste and the diversity on each underground station’s rail. I ignore my bank account because it gives me anxiety and try to focus on the adventure on foot. I know I can’t go on like this forever, drowning in my made up romance of a city, but I feel like I’m floating over reality sometimes. Or at least, I wish to.
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Chapter 02
I cry at night and laugh during the day, drink at the pub and laugh at Never Have I Ever games. I dance to songs of The Kooks in extremely small local dancing venuessomewhere underground. I have work at 8 tomorrow. Why am I still here? I don’t know. Just hoping for a good time. I wake up to my landlord and house mate cooking Indian lunch. I tip-toe to the bathroom because I’m still not very familiar with them. I walk past Costa Coffee and wave to the friendly older man sitting by the same window same time, every day. We know each other by name. He gives me love advice when I come back from rain showers.
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Chapter 03
Chapter 03
Chasing the sun in this rainy city
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Do you ever feel like you’re in control? I do for now, for the first time ... in a long while. Even though nothing is really in my control, by any means. I just feel like I am because I am where I want to be and I look in the mirror and sometimes I nod and know I am who I want to be. And when I’m not, I remind myself that it’s okay to be whoever – it is London. No one gives a fuck. No one. Gives. A Fuck. You’re just living life and you roll with every song that’s played.
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Chapter 03
Adapted from the song, New York I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down.
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Chapter 03 I still cry without reason sometimes. I still throw fits when no one sees and I have met new kinds of demons living in this city, in my head. Sometimes I feel like I’m part of something so big it’s comforting. Sometimes I feel swallowed in the crowd and lonely and left alone. When I sit on the tube, I use my headphones to drown out my mind. I can’t help but notice that everyone else is doing the same as we stare at each other.
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Chapter 03
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Chapter 03 I have depressing episodes where I don’t get out of bed for days, not even to eat. But I also have days where I get up and decide to have the best time of my life. I have days where I spend hours dressing up to just stay home because I hate the way I look anyway. But I also have days where I meet my friends and throw on whatever and put on make-up and dance around in underwear at their place to sexy music whilst getting ready. And when my girls and I go and have a blast and come home and remove our make-up and talk about boys as we drift to sleep.
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Chapter 04
Chapter 04
Towards the end
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Chapter 04 They say you leave parts of you in every place. And take a part of a place with you. In a completely different way than just in souvenirs. I have left pieces of myself scattered all over the streets, shopping malls, alleys, independent coffee shops, brim-filled pubs and cute Italian restaurants by Primrose hill. And I have taken each and every memory with me that connect me to those places until today. I was a different person before I got to those places and I left them as a different person, too. I am grateful. So grateful.
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Chapter 04
(I got thrown out of my room before my lease was up by my landlord because of a misunderstanding and I had exactly one day to pack before the new tenant was going to move in. So I suffered a bit of a panic attack at work. Lisa, my supervisor and colleague at my internship, kindly let me stay at her place for a few days before I would leave. I prewrote the following note and wrote it again on paper for her to read before I left. Even in the worst times there are angels to help out.
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I will never forget about the way this city makes me feel. I am feeling things I have never felt before. It’s scary and at the same time, I crave for more. More, more, more. If it means more heartbreak, I’ll take it. If it means more awkward moments, I’ll take it. Each struggle will be a lesson I will be able to laugh about in a few year’s time. And who knows, maybe that’s when I’ll be back for London again.
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Chapter 04
Thank you for flipping through my story.
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