Praise be for a quiet life
The first thing I did this morning was to travel by tube all the way from London’s Finchley Road to Sloane Square to register myself for a couple of returns to see Chekhov’s The Seagull with Kristin Scott Thomas at the Royal Court Theatre. However, even though I tried to be there as early as possible, I was too late. Not that I didn’t get on the list, just that 11 people got there before me. I am 12th on the list, which, according to basic arithmetic, tells me that there would have to be at least 24 returned tickets tonight before I could get in. This, I think, is completely impossible.
Of course, this is not the end of the world. After all, I am in London, where there is a multitude of other things I could do without too much thought and, as a matter of fact, I already know my alternatives. To start with, tonight the National Gallery holds a preview of an exhibition of Renoir’s landscapes and a friend of mine, one of the movers and shakers of the London art world, has just called me to check if I am interested. Another friend, a talented sitar player is performing in Oxford, so I could travel there. Thirdly, there are also a few good movies on, such as Notes on a Scandal or Bamako, so I could also end my evening in the cinema.
I could also entertain myself in a much simpler way at Virgin Records, listening to the various CDs I am interested in buying and determining whether they are worth it, or going around various bookshops and seeing what is new in the publishing world. Plus there are all these wonderful clothes I would like to try on, and shoes, and oh no, I have forgotten all about Gilbert and George at Tate Modern, not to mention the little Japanese patisserie near Piccadilly Circus where they serve real green tea and a soft sweet rice cake, a jazz concert at Pizza Express and the Flamenco Festival at Sadler’s Wells.
Honestly, I thought that a week in London would have been enough to do everything I wanted but now I see this is not the case. But, what I am really getting at is, surprise, surprise, something else. You see, I have recently come to the conclusion that while it is impossible to be bored in London, I don’t think I would like to live there again.
Five or six years ago, soon after I moved to Cyprus, I had a conversation about the reasons some people preferred it to the UK with a lady who had been living on the island for more than 20 years. At that time, I was still missing Notting Hill Gate and my life there. The walk down Makarios Avenue wasn’t as exciting for me as it is now, shopping at Alpha Mega not a culmination of my weekly activities and watching a film at K-Cineplex not a digestible form of entertainment. Therefore, no wonder, I listened to the lady in horror.
“It is just so peaceful here,” she said. “I hate big cities, the noise, the crowds. Here it is bliss. You can relax. You don’t have to race anywhere.”
How times have changed. Yesterday, I was talking to some of my London-based friends and telling them how much I disliked the place, and how difficult, in fact, my life had been there.
“I used to have nightmares,” I said. “I was scared that I would end up as one of these old people, completely alone, with no family, slowly dying while being visited twice a week by social welfare. Or, even worse, that I would be 80 and still have 20 years to go on a mortgage. I used to wake up every night at four o’clock feeling I should get up and work because otherwise my fears would be realised. But Cyprus is different, there aren’t such vibes in the air. People are more relaxed and I am calmer there as well.”
They looked at me, most likely in the same way I had at that lady five years ago, and probably thought I had gone completely mad. However, it is true. Neither Gilbert and George nor Chekhov can compete with the fact that before I went away the owner of my local shop in Ayios Kassianos told me that if the lady who feeds my cats needed some food for them she could get it from him on credit.
“You will pay when you are back,” he said and it made me feel much more comfortable than shopping at Waitrose or any spiritual experience at Tate Modern.
