Backpack Storybook

London, United Kingdom - Like a lot of Aussies living in London, sometimes I feel like my life is ruled by some sort of invisible 'to do' list.

There's things on it you just have to do because you're in London. Whether you really want to or not.

The Walkabout on Australia Day. Portobello Road markets. Wimbledon (although don't get me wrong, it was great fun, just a lot of fucking about to get there).

This weekend it was the Notting Hill Carnival. Everyone I'd talked to that had been before said they were glad they went, but that they wouldn't go back in a hurry.

Apparently it got so jammed packed with people you could hardly walk. Just getting to a tube station took hours. Gangs of youths terrified the crowds and pick pocketed people.

With that sort of recommendation weighing on my mind, and knowing my aversion to crowds, I enlisted back up in the form of my girlfriend Jacq and two mates from touch rugby and off we went along with the hundreds of thousands of people to west London.

You can read about yet another of my sister's right-time right-place experiences here. She went on the Sunday, supposedly the more sedate Family Day.

We arrived bang in the middle of adults day on Monday of the Bank Holiday. A spicy fog of barbecuing jerk chicken hung in the air. Reggae beats boomed from the (often home made) bass bins of the infamous sound systems on every second corner.

Freaks, weirdos, rastas, tourists, middle class gawpers, home boys, white boys and police rubbed shoulders along the many side roads. Entire streets of shops were boarded up with plywood like they were expecting a hurricane. Which they were, of sorts. A storm of people.

Instead, residents had set up temporary shops at the front of their terraces. Beers for £3. Chicken, beans and rice. Whistles and horns. Everything you need for a day out among London's Caribbean population.

The Carnivale-style parade is what links the event together and gives it its purpose. It arrived mid afternoon almost unannounced while we were ambling along, bellys full with jerk chicken and Red Stripe beers.

I tell you what, the rise of the digital camera has something to answer for. As the colourful dancers strutted past a thousand sets of arms shot into the air to record the scene for Flickr, Facebook and every other website (Backpack Storybook included).

The steel drums were my favourite, their Calypso rhythms getting my hips moving where the brasher reggae tunes simply resonated my entire rib cage with their volume.

And then the parade was past. With work the next day on the back of our minds and feet getting tired, we repaired to a near by pub for a beer and then beat the crowds (and much later, the stabbings and shootings) to Paddington train station, bound for home.

Labels: UK