I went with friends to Tate Britian to see the Hurvin Anderson exhibition. The show has now closed, but it was a fine exhibition by an Anglo-Caribbean artist who was brought up in Birmingham. The pictures had a slightly evasive feel. You got the sense that the artist was not entirely comfortable as a Jamaican or as a Brit. Some of his works are very fine paintings indeed but they keep the viewer at arms-length. One of my friends, born in the UK but from an Indian family, made the point that’s how it often feels as an ex-pat. There is a persistent low level of disconnect or unease.
My family and I lived and worked in Bangkok for eight years. When our daughter reached the age of twelve, we decided to debunk back to London. We’d met many so-called third country kids, who called their parent’s home their home even if they hardly knew it at all. It made then all somewhat rootless. We didn’t want that for our daughter.
After visiting the exhibition, we went to the cafe at the gallery and continued our conversations which soon became hi-jacked by the topic of London, the city where we all live. Throughout many of these posts I’ve made my love for the place very clear, so I don’t need to rehearse those arguments again.
Finishing our coffee we all walked back over Vauxhall Bridge to our homes. Later that afternoon one of them sent me the FT article which you can see above. It starts:
An evening walk through Islington with an Australian friend. He looks around at the Georgian facades, at the Lime-biking locals, and grows ruminative. “They say it’s the best city in the world …I wait for the counter-argument. … but they don’t say it enough.
So, I think we know where he stands but what I found interesting were his suggestions for the two main contenders. Perhaps because it’s the FT, a paper with more than a passing interest in money, the clue is in the name, he suggested Singapore and Dubai.
I’ve worked in both cities and the idea that either could ever become the greatest city in the world seems fanciful. Dubai is endless roads through a desert with each skyrise madder and more ugly than the last. Of course, their tourist trade has been decapitated on account of President Trump’s special military operation in Iran and the subsequent drone attacks on US allies in the region. As to Singapore, in many ways it’s a beautiful place, but small and has more banking culture than indigenous culture. To anyone who has lived out east it’s ‘Asia Light’ not the full fat version as experienced in Bangkok or Kuala Lumpur.
It’s hard to argue with the FT writer when he says this: A city has to be rich for centuries, not decades, to accrue the sheer quantity of stuff that makes it the best, or at least most complete. Live in one, and the notion of western decline can feel abstract and remote.
I remember when first moving to Bangkok and going to their National Gallery, without wishing to be unkind the was no picture of world class importance. Don’t get me wrong I loved living in Thailand, which is stuffed full of intriguing local culture, but the world’s greatest city? Not by a mile.
I always used to say that New York was my other favourite city, but like many I wouldn’t choose to visit there now on account of the present administration. How do you make an enemy of Canada for goodness sake? So, for now it’s London, but hang on what about Paris? I leave it to you to decide.
A Little London Life 