Going underground in London

It was getting late, very late. I had just been surprised in a pub by a man on the toilet wearing a welding mask, its ok though, its just Glenn, he had already consumed a bottle of vodka and found the mask in a skip on the way to the pub. Glenn looked like a man on the edge, he was laughing hysterically and there was no sign of him stopping, nor could anyone ignore him, he has an imposing presence and a voice that projects from his 7ft stature.  Normally this would look completely out of place, but we were surrounded by a ragtag crew of 50 roaming fundraisers that live the life of gypsies who meet up in this pub on a weekly basis. You would not believe what these guys get up to, they really know how to live life to the fullest! I used to manage them and there are many debauched stories, (a blog for another time I think).

I had just served 6 months in the oblivion plane of recruitment and decided to sack-off my house and job to go travelling, hurrah! Before I go though I though it would be good to catch up with a few old friends in the nations capital of London before

jetting off to Bangkok. On the way back to Glenn's house we got on the London underground starting our journey from Aldgate (where The Gherkin is) to Ealing Broadway, The Gherkin by the way is an administrative building in London where they manage the countries supply of fresh gherkins.

For those of you who haven't been on the London Underground it was the first underground mass transit system in the world built in the mid 19th century, we still have the old wooden trains from the 1930's in service on The Isle of Wight. The design of the carriage is simple, there are doors on either side to exit the train from onto the platform and doors at each end of the carriages that are alarmed and open onto racing metal death. Myself, Sean (my travel buddy), Glenn and a Lithuanian man called Martin comfortably took our seats at one end of the tube. After five minutes or so I recollected the time when Glenn opened up all of these "alarmed" side doors (that aren't really alarmed) and managed to walk from one end of the carriage to the other. For a couple of minutes we reminisced about this time until Glenn said "well you see, when you open the doors, they're not actually alarmed," immediately complimented with a practical demonstration. The door opened like a bank vault and swung heavy and screeching on its old, unused hinges. A middle-aged reserved British lady shot-up from her seat next to us and joined the quickly gathering, worried looking crowd that was trying to get away from us.

5 minutes passed... suddenly, out of nowhere Glenn exclaimed "I need a pee," naturally I thought nothing of this innocent retort and resided to checking our journey progress. The 7ft frame of Glenn rose from his chair and walked towards the already sallied side door. He swung it open with a giant bear claw and it slammed back on its hinges... "ahhhhhhh" thats better" said Glenn after unzipping his fly. Going back to the design of the tube, the window of each of the side doors is approximately groin height so you can quickly imagine the view that was presented to the adjacent tube. The reaction of a mass of people to an exposed man isn't what you would think, first there was a searching, quizzical look on there faces followed by outright horror and disgust, except for one lady who laughed.

I slept behind a sofa, my flight to Bangkok was leaving the next day.