Thursday, August 24, 2006

The all-new and improved 8th circle of hell.

My mum had never been to Harrods. So I took her there. And we looked at the Dodi and Di memorial where people were taking pictures with their phones. And we didn't buy over priced tea. And we got the hell out of there. 23 minutes all up.

I was reminded of those medieval paintings by Bosch, Breugel and Cranach of judgment day. Something about the twisted, contorted faces and the rampant rudeness and the pinched snootiness of those people who believe they're a cut above because they have money. And the poor, bewildered tourists who looked like they'd wandered into Hades itself.

I love London but I guess one of the reasons it is the way it is, is it's greed. Unfettered gluttony and rapacity. Luckily there are other bits that I like. And I don't have to go to the ones I don't like.

(I didn't even go on a spying mission to the Waterstones in Harrods but I did go to the one in Hampstead which is a damn fine bookshop. If only they took out all those stoopid promotions it would be one of the best. Whoever's working up there knows their stuff, dammit. Many recce's are planned. I do like industrial espionage)

3 comments:

  1. I was thrown out of Harrods the only time I ever visited for eating a stick of rock in the menswear department...

    But Al bankrolls my footie team so my loyalties are kind of divided!

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  2. that was me obviously...

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  3. Don't you mean that you ate a man stick in the Rocawear Department?

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