1. Evelyn Puddingface Capps. Because America has her and the rest of the world doesn't. And because I am not in America. (Gratuitous pictures of Eblum being sweet and sleepy)
I understand why this is, but I still don't like it. For 10.5 to 11 months out of the year, it rarely gets over 80 degrees F in the middle of the day. But it is still warm and 99% humidity. A/C cools air, but most importantly it dehumidifies it. There has been a heatwave across Europe for the last few weeks, and there is nowhere to go to escape it except for The British Library (which I've sworn off for the time being) or the refrigerated aisle of the grocery store. The inside is worse that the outside here. The temperature is the same, but at least outside you get a bit of a breeze and sunlight to dry up the sweat, instead of the chronic clammy skin you get inside. During this heatwave, I worked for a week at the Senate House Library (which had one of the first primitive models of central air in the country and now has Zero climate control) and, most recently, I've been working at the British Museum of Natural History in South Kensington. The main reading room in the library and archives got so miserable (evidently the staff revolted), that they moved us into the marginally cooler Geological Survey wing. It may be cooler, but it overlooks the loading dock of the museum restaurant and from around 11:30 to 2, delicious smells (steak and ale pie mixed with freshly baked cookies) waft in the open windows, which would be fine if my budget didn't require me to have brought a peanut butter sandwich and a bruised apple for lunch. I digress.
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| In America, we're all like this. |
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| In the UK, we're all like this. |
3. Elbow room while shopping. The American chaplain at the place I'm staying was saying today how she missed Target. I just miss being able to walk down an aisle at the grocery store without having to say excuse me 10 times because it is physically impossible for two people with small shopping baskets to pass one another. People in London basically shop every day (or close to it). They really don't pile into the car once a week and head to Costco or the Winn-Dixie with their coupons and grocery lists, load up their cart full of the week's scoff, and cart it all home. Most people don't drive on a daily basis, so you're limited to what you can carry. And all the grocery stores in the city are crammed into the ground floors of what used to be 18th century townhouses. The line to check out is always long, no matter what time of day, mostly with tourists buying packaged sandwiches and Diet Coke, and there is usually a man at the end of the line barking at people to use the self checkout and getting annoyed when you tell them you need to use the regular one. They assume that you are buying cigarettes, but I have to use a swipe card (which always annoys the cashiers), so I don't fool with the machines. But, I digress.
| Look at these pleasant looking people in nice wide aisles. |
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| Whereas shopping in London is about as personal space friendly as rush hour on the Tube. |
5. Decent tap water. Now, I have a very high standard for tap water to be called good, but it should be acceptable. I don't really know the chemistry of water, and why some water is great and some water tastes like old toilet water, but I grew up with really clear, almost sweet-tasting water. Seriously, it won an award for best tasting water: http://www.benzinga.com/press-releases/11/06/p1168797/greenville-sc-wins-best-of-the-best-water-taste-test. I've experienced beach water (too much sodium), mountain water (too much everything), and city water (Chicago and New York, not great, but acceptable). But here in London....People here drink a whole lot of bottled water here. I think it is pretty damn ridiculous, generally speaking, to buy something that comes out of the tap for free. I mean, you're just paying money for someone else's tap water, plus I think most bottled water tastes funny, but I don't drink the tap water here unless there is more ice in the cup than water and I have a little lemon juice. Basically what happens is they take the water out of the Thames (where sewage, chemicals, and garbage have been), treat the shit out of it to kill all the nasties, and then let it run through old, rusty pipes to your sink and shower. It tastes like someone tried to run a bunch of pond water through a Brita filter. Maybe there are American places that have nastier water, but I haven't been there.
6. Ice. I spend probably $5-6 a week on bagged ice. I'm a Southerner. I need ice. When I go to a restaurant, I expect there to be a very large cup of ice, doused in tap water. I am a connoisseur of good ice (Sonic, Zaxbies, most hospitals, the QT). If you go to a McDonald's here, the most American place in the world, and order a Diet Coke, you will get a luke-warm, under-carbonated soda with one piece of ice in it. Unacceptable!
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| Just look at this beautiful mountain of ice. |
7. Customer Service. This one is going to make me sound all Republican, I know. Indulge me, if you will. Having worked in the private sector service industry (Starbucks, mainly), I can tell you that Americans take that whole "the customer is always right" thing pretty seriously. Obviously, the customer is usually never right, but if your goal is to extract money from them, then you want to keep them happy. More importantly, if you want to keep your job, you don't want a customer/client/guest to complain about anything. You bite your tongue when someone is annoying, demanding, or treats you like shit. We hire secret shoppers to "catch" you if you aren't representing the company the right way. When I worked at Starbucks, we were required to read our Secret Shopper surveys. Customer service is especially important on an individual level in tip-based industries, but it isn't just service for tips or commission. Just go to a Cost-co or Trader Joes or Best Buy or even call the cable company. Sure, you'll have a rude or indifferent person here and there, but mostly these are pleasant encounters. The main time that you come into contact with people who treat you (the customer/inquirer) like shit is when you go to a government office (i.e. the Health Department, the DMV, and, god-forbid, the Post Office). You know, those places where you are at the mercy of the clerk and not the other way around. I would like to add here that my experiences with all these admirable institutions in South Carolina and small-town Hudson Valley has been vastly different than my experiences in Chicago and New York. Basically, when I think about rude, disinterested, clerks/cashiers/etc, I'm thinking of my neighborhood U.S. Post Office on Cottage Grove in Chicago. Now imagine if nearly every customer service interaction you had felt like you were at the Passport Office and had filled out the wrong form. That's what it is like here, because:
Nobody is going to get fired here for being rude or unhelpful or having a bunch of customer complaints. You'd basically have to hit someone's baby to get fired. And even then, you'd probably be put on paid administrative leave pending investigation. Workers are protected here. They don't anxiously look and see if their name pops up on the Secret Shopper report ("Barista named Maura failed to wish me a good rest of the day when she handed me my Venti double blended Frappucino"). Now, I'm all for worker's rights and job security and living wages. I'm just a bit disappointed that it doesn't usually translate into more pleasant customer interactions.
8. Free, reasonably clean toilets. Not unheard of here (I'm keeping a running list of clean places to pee for free), but harder to find.
9. Big movie multiplexes. A multiplex in London has, like, three theaters, which are usually cramped and outdated. So if you wanted to see Monsters University and Despicable Me 2, you might have to go to two different theaters. And there are no movies that start after 8 pm. And it costs $22 for one ticket. And they get the latest Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy movie a month later than everyone else.
10. Free Refills and condiments.
11. Breakfast.
When you go all out for breakfast, it should look like this:
When you go all out for breakfast here, it looks like this.
Unacceptable.
literally lol
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