On January 1st at 6am my very first visitor of 2008 arrived. More precisely my first visitor since being in England arrived, and as you’ve probably guessed from the title, his name is Tony.

If this were a Guy Ritchie flick this would be the Turkish-narrated-flashback surmising the character and circumstance of Tony, though if it were a Guy Ritchie film he would be “Trigger Tony” or “Tony Two Guns” or the like, while the camera shots would be quick cut and as sickly stylistic as one could stomach.

I’ll spare you in such and just skip to the facts: Tony is from Denver, and the two of us met while going disaster relief work in New Orleans. We were both staying in the same workers dorm, and had some rather great times in our short one week together. In fact one of the highlight of my time there was when one evening whilst having drive-thru margaritas in the Dietrich’s trailer he in innocence made a mistakenly harsh comment that had Paige and I crying with laughter for quite nearly an hour. I’d explain his comment and the context but it was so situational that any explanation would be nullified by saying “you just had to be there.”

Truth be told I didn’t know Tony all that well before this trip. Sure we’ve kept in contact some since our week in Louisiana, but it may seem odd that he would be my first visitor. However that is precisely what I like about Tony. He is from the same school of thought as I when it comes to the randomness of adventure and taking an opportunity when it presents itself. If I hear someone casually say: “Yeah, come visit anytime.” I assume in all earnest, and possibly ignorance that they mean it, and intend to take them up on it! The same goes for Tony, I told him in New Orleans come visit England while I’m there and so he did.

He did however come at a slightly awkward time. I had only been back from camping for a day or so before I had to head down to London where I said I would meet him. With his early morning flight this meant that I had to head down the night before, which in turn meant that I’d be in London for New Years Eve. Since this was the case, as well as my bank account growing low, I decided it would just be better to stay up all night (rather than book a hostel) and as I traveled down to London by train wondered what kind of adventure was in store for me.

Arriving back in London was fantastic. I haven’t been since my initial arrival in September in which I was so taken by it. It was like visiting an old friend and the instant I stepped out of the train station I felt elated. This joy pervaded as I busied myself with the task of finding the best spot to see a fantastic fireworks display. I figured that being one of the largest (and coolest) cities in the world it would have a fantastic display I could observe.

Finding such was an inept experience however. There seemed to be loads of people being driven to a certain point somewhere in London so I figured I’d follow the heard and see where they were going. But my plan backfired in that the heard would start to dwindle down until ultimately there was an opposing gaggle of people heading in the complete opposite direction. Not wanting to swim against the current I would change course and follow this new throng of people but was always met with the same outcome. No matter which school of fish I swam with I could see no destination point and would sooner or later be heading in the opposite direction from the crowds. It was so strange, almost as if all of London had orchestrated a prank against me. Ultimately I opted just to go to London Bridge where a crowd was starting to gather and wait for the clock to wind down.

As I sat waiting thinking how great my plan was I imagined all of the River Thames lit up with dazzles of colors and shapes. I pictured the award winning photographs I’d take of Tower Bridge illuminated in the distance by the expected array of splendor. But as the clock struck 12 and the New Year dawned all I was met with was a blocked view. There are no fireworks on or near the river. Rather they were all in two squares in the city, my view being obstructed by the buildings. Every once in a while a firework would spring up over the top of a building but never with enough frequency to make me feel better about being wet and cold on the cursed bridge.

I left the bridge and wandered towards the general direction of the fireworks I saw. This time I knew I was heading in the right direction because thousands upon thousands of London folk were heading from there. Again I was a fish swimming upstream but this time it was a bit different. I began to notice that everyone seemed to have an empty champagne bottle in hand as if as in courtesy the city passed them out. The people’s general behavior would likewise suggest the same, and in an unexplainably surreal moment I felt like the only sober boy in al of London.

I therefore decided to change my plans from wondering a bit. CityBank or Northern Rock or someone (showing just how effective this advertising strategy really was) opted to pay for all subways, trains, and busses in the 3 central zones of London from 11:45pm till 4:30am. Being completely free I thought it would be a perfect time to explore parts of London I hadn’t previously seen. In retrospect this admittedly was a bad idea.

This is for two reasons. One is that it was free for everyone so there wasn’t much monitoring of how many people would cram onto the tube or trains. There was hardly room to breath and in the event that you could you wouldn’t want to breath in the mixture of piss and vodka that permeated the air. Also being so closely packed there was a considerable amount of fragile tension that would soon to be acted upon.

What began as comments in almost drunken innocence erupted into drunken aggression and racism on one train. A fight began to ensue and could have gotten quite bad except for the confined space of it all. The aggressive party couldn’t actually get through the mass of sardine-packed-people to fight the others. Even if they could, the sheer confines of said people would have prevented any punches from being thrown. So instead they exchanged vulgarities in alcohol soaked and strained throats. They got off at the next stop and most were fed up with trying to calm the situation and were content to just let them have a go at each other. We began to pull off and if they did indeed begin to fight I was too blocked by people to see. It was like being in a filled clown car at the circus.

The next reason for it being not the greatest idea came shortly thereafter. I decided to get off the train a few stops later. I couldn’t see if was my stop or not so I just guessed. I guessed wrong. Not only was it not my stop, but also I had no idea where I was. It soon became clear however that I was in one of London’s worst neighborhoods at 3:30 am New Years Day. Not that this made me terribly insecure (seeing how it is England not the US) but the previous occurrence on the train and the unreasonableness of the drunken minds did make me a bit on edge. So I thought I’d just wait for the next train to come. While waiting I drifted of to sleep for about a half an hour. I was exhausted from miles of walking and the very rushed and busy day I had spent even before getting to London.

When I awoke I realized that the train I was on must have been the last train and that now I’d have to try to take a series of busses to try to get to the airport. This didn’t exactly work out as planned and I ended up walking the last 6 miles to get to the airport, at certain points walking in areas that I’m sure were security restricted from civilians…

At long last I arrived doggedly determined to the airport and waited for Tony’s only slightly delayed flight. As I waited I tried to imagine what the two weeks would hold. Then my mind became preoccupied with an altogether different thought: “Will I even recognize him?” A smile crept upon my face in acknowledgment of the last minute planning for his arrival, if you can call it planning, as well as the acceptance of the unknown escapades that can thus be had on such an expedition. It was to be a good two weeks!