Here am I, one day more, sharing with you, my lovely and nonexistent reader, other episode of my Londoner adventures. This exiting newest episode comes to you full of drama, comedy and suspense. How every story, it has a beginning and this one was placed on 9th of July, 5.15 a.m.
5.15 a.m.
The alarm beeps. Fuck. Usually it sounds at 5.30, just to let myself the pleasure of turn it off and keep sleeping half an hour more. Today I am not that lucky. Today there's no tube service at all, today there is a strike, what means I need to get Waterloo by bus, and I need two buses to do it. A second look at the phone tells me that I've expended about five minutes wallowing in self-pity. Time to get up. I get awkwardly off the bed, because my side is against the wall. Walk over my girlfriend's cousin, who sleeps on a mattress just placed on the floor to get the door and be able to go to the toilet, relieve myself and wash my face, slowly, since I am bloody sleepy. Once I'm done, I walk back to the room, suit me up, take my stuff and walk out through the flat door. I have time, so I don't need to run.
5.45 a.m.
The day is sunny, and it isn't cold at all. I walk my way to the bus stop just thinking how sleepy I am. I should be sleeping yet, everybody should be sleeping! According TFL webpage I need to take my bus earlier than 6:03 so I am in my time more than ever. Once in the bus stop I have to wait no more than a few minutes to the bus coming. It come plenty of people, but not as full to pass through the stop without stopping. It's normal, with or without strike most of the people are still sleeping, because they don't need to travel that long everyday to work. I step in the bus, pass my Oyster over the reader and... fuck! That unmistakable beep can just mean one thing. I haven't got money enough to the second bus. Amazing.
6.40 a.m.
I've got Holborn without troubles. The bus was full so I couldn't take a seat during the whole trip, and now I have to walk from here to Waterloo. Well, it isn't a long walk, and I have time enough (although my time advantage is going to be affected), but It's still pretty early to me getting a walk, nothing enjoyable. Still, a man has to do whatever he has, so I have a deep breath and start my travel. Walking has never killed anyone, has it? Even so, I have to be thankful, without the walk, I had never watched London from Waterloo Bridge in the morning. It is a nice view and I am pretty sure I'll never get it again.
7:00 a.m
I arrived to the station with enough time to get my train. I am proud of myself. I have problems to getting here on usual days but the hardest day I get in time. I wouldn't have bet on me, and I'd have lost. I buy my daily ticket, walk to my train, get in and sit myself down. I take out my last comic book out of my bag and enjoy the reading until Weybrigde. I am at work at my usual hour (when I take the bus at time) and pass my day as usual, with all this lovely technologies as Sorax or CXL, with the concern about my way back. I know that's gonna be the hard part of the day.
6:45 p.m
I should have gone early today, I know is not going to be easy to get home with the strike, maybe coming here wasn't hard at all, but that time wasn't a busy time either. Now, millions of people are out of their works, going there and here chasing a chance to get their homes at time. It's gonna be rough. But there is nobody to drop me at the train station and I am bloody tired to get it by shoe, so I've been waiting to my wonderful colleague to give me a lift. I am able to get the 7:06 train and just half and hour later I am on Waterloo, walking through the station to get the bus stops, there are many buses to Holborn so I get in the first one coming and before 8 I am in there taking out of the bus just in front of the closed tube station, walking to Procter Street to get my last bus and, hopefully, being home before 9, because traffic sucks at this time.
7:50 p.mI am in the stop, and it's crazy. There are people, many people, and the keep coming, not like the bus is doing. If a fresh bus came now, It'd be impossible to all the people get in, and I know the bus is not coming fresh... it'll be coming full like hell. In the best of the scenarios, there won't be any room inside, so the bus will pass through and we'll have to wait uncertain time until we'll be able to put a foot in a bus. That can become ugly, and after 25 minutes waiting and the bus not coming I decide to walk off and leave. I have no plan about it, I just know I am not going to get a bus there in a long, so I move forward the bus way, maybe I'll find another stop with less people, and where the bus has dropped some of the travelers. I don't know.
8:25 p.m
I am hungry. I refuse to walk a single step more without any of food. I get into a supermarket somewhere between Procter St. and Holborn Circus and provide myself with a meal deal. Drink coke is going to be good. I was right, round here the stops are quieter, but the buses are still full so there's no chance to get one. I fell kind of sorry about the people waiting in that stop, No way buses are stopping there. I keep walking. I am tired, but the sandwich is helping me to don't lose my energies and sleepover in a park. After a eternity I get City Thameslink Railway Station. Maybe I can get a train there straight away to Whitechapel, and hopefully, in there, taking a bus will be easy pie, at least the 205. But no, I don't understand the trains in this city, why they don't just have a mpa in the stations to see how get the places? The only maps I can find are the lines passing directely through this station, and there isn't a line connecting here and Whitechapel. Poor me. I'm pretty tired to figure out anything, so I'll take the easiest solution, keep walking towards my house.
9:05 p.m
Bank Station. Did I tell I am tired? I have a chance now, my last hope. DLR is working and bank has a DLR station, I just need to get there and use the DLR to Limehouse, is not as close as Stepney Green, but it's close enough to me. I am here now. I approach the entry of the station... and it's close. There is a connection underground between Bank and Monument stations, and it looks like to get DLR station I need to walk down to Monument. I've done that way a few times, is nothing, but I am tired, really. I am not trying a running gag here. I just wanna get home as soon as possible, and probably spent the night crying on my pillow. Com'on Brayan! Put yourself together. You can do it! I walk down to Monument, get inside the stations, walk up to Bank DLR shorter than a blink. Wait the train, get inside, say thanks to the city gods to let me sleep in my bed this night and count the seconds to get Limehouse, just two stops from Bank.
9:45 p.m
I walk out from Limehouse station and I am disoriented. I've been close here a couple of times, but never in the station so I need to get oriented. Just in front of me there is a cycle hire those bikes that one day, suddenly, become from Barclays to Santander and nobody looks to have noticed. I use the map there to know which one was the way to my home. I figure it out, and start walking, one more time, to my house. About 10 I finally get my house, my girlfriend has been a day off, but we couldn't take advantage on it, so I've been the whole walking through the city. I am... ok, I won't say it again, but once I get my flat, I open the door and I kiss my girlfriend, I get the bed like never in my life.
Thanks for reading.
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