A few days in London with family.
The weather is hot but not humid.
By late afternoon the streets are busy and all the outside cafe tables full. Some restaurants manage to squeeze in not two but three evening sittings. Queues at trendy restaurants have become a thing. With unemployment running at 3.8% ( effectively non-existent ) there is a definite shortage of staff. Those shop and restaurant owners who haven't adjusted their wages ( and prices ) higher in this new environment are suffering. Pre-Brexit the UK relied on employees from the EU to run the hospitality industry. Now that source of labour has largely been closed off - with painful consequences for some. Angus notes that the business suit is a semi rarity and the neck tie an endangered species.
There's a Swedish village with bars selling Swedish aquavit.
The papers may be full of dire economic news but no one has told the good natured people out enjoying themselves. Law abiding 20 somethings stand crammed together behind the pavement barriers outside pubs dutifully leaving a path for pedestrians to navigate their way alongside .
Having moved back after two decades abroad you get the sense that you're in a place that's brash and confident and more than a little quirky. It's certainly a world apart from the wee town on the Scottish coast or the depths of France profonde...or Paris or Berlin. In the super busy international hotel the woman behind reception looks at our reservation and comments ' You've come a long way '. This says a lot about English spatial perception. She says the hotel is fully booked and estimates the guests to be 40% American, 20% from the Middle Eastern, 30% from Asia and the remaining 10% to be Europeans. Before Brexit the European number would have been much higher.
