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A very British affair

CENTRAL FIGURE The Hampshire

Not anyone can become a Black Taxi Cab driver in London. The examination process takes three years and it is rigorous. A black taxi cab driver should be able to get you to your destination if you just tell him the address.

So after lugging my luggage off the Heathrow Express at Paddington at 8.15 a.m. on a Thursday morning I tried to get into the tube to Leicester Square.

I just couldn’t. Rush hour was one reason and there was no way I could have lugged two bags onto the tube through the mass of humanity that descends on the London underground during rush hour between 7.30 a.m. and 9.30 a.m.

I caught the cab outside Paddington station and settled down in the rear with a sigh.

“The Hampshire at Liecester Square, please,” I told the driver. He paused for as much time as it takes for my computer to open a word document and nodded. So well versed was he with the streets that it took all of two seconds for the in-built map of London in his brain to deliver him the route.

Thirty minutes after checking into the Radisson Edwardian Hampshire at Liecester Square I realised that this hotel has a winning location. Looking out of my room Leicester Square Garden was so close that I could almost touch the grass. Right below my window was the half-price ticket booth where tickets to London’s musicals can be bought at a whopping discount.

Out of the chic revolving doors and a three-minute walk had me looking up at Nelson frozen in stone on the Nelson Column at Trafalgar Square, looking in the direction of Westminster and the Big Ben.

Trafalgar Square is the pulse of tourist London, there are visitors from the world over sitting in the lawns or dipping their toes in the water fountains or posing on the four huge lions around the column.

And London is a walking city, I walked on from there down Pall Mall towards St. James Square. Along this oh-so-posh road you will find shops bearing the royal crest that signify that they are ‘By Appointment Suppliers to Her Majesty’.

I visited a cigar shop, dripping with old world charm, where the old man behind the counter went deep into every aspect of selecting, storing and smoking a cigar. Most computer and car showrooms, I’ve visited don’t have salesmen with half the enthusiasm.

A little distance ahead was a little spirit shop where the man behind the counter modestly told me that they maintain immaculate records. And in these records you would find the amount of brandy the Duke of Wellington and Admiral Nelson bought. Continuing my refreshing ramble through London I walked on from St. James Square to Covent Garden. Covent Garden is always buzzing. Though Londoners say it’s too touristy, I just loved it. Markets, musicians and outdoor cafés all make Covent Garden vibrant.

It was, in the 18th century a fruit and vegetable market and little Charlie Dickens who worked around the market as a boy would come and stare at exotic tropical fruits like pineapples and wonder how they would taste. He couldn’t afford to buy one then.

Jetlag and fatigue was slowly overcoming enthusiasm when I hailed another black cab to take me back to my hotel. I got in and told him to take me there when he turned and gave me a bemused look.

“Are you sure? It will be quicker to walk mate.”

And it was, Liecester Square is just beyond Covent Garden and as I went through the revolving doors I once again marvelled at the Hampshire’s bang on location in central London.

RISHAD SAAM MEHTA

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