how not to get attacked on the streets of london
and other life lessons
A woman pushed me over in the street the other day. I guess you could say it was an unprovoked attack, but I wasn’t badly hurt. I was travelling from lunch in Covent Garden to a meeting in Westminster and decided on the spur of the moment to hire a bike. The only one I could find was one of those heavy electric ones you hire by the hour with an app so downloaded the app and scanned a QR code, added my payment details, etc. Then I shoved my work stuff in the front basket and hopped on in a rush.
Not far from Trafalgar Square I pulled up to a small intersection and an unmarked police car whizzed through, sirens blaring, drawing everyone halt. Annoyingly, I missed the light. Once the cop car was gone, I saw another chance: I could shave a few seconds off my journey by sneaking over the road, bypassing the hoards of pedestrians waiting to cross.
I pressed down on the left pedal and the bike shot forward, causing the overloaded steering to wobble a bit. Just then I heard a loud female voice to my right.
‘I’ll have you arrested! Shall I push you off your bike? How would you like that?’
The next thing I knew I was in the middle of the intersection, leg pinned under the electric bike, wheels spinning, wondering what had just happened. I looked around dazed. My work papers were scattered all over the pavement to my left. Standing over me was a plump dark blonde woman, mid-60s, dressed in a beige skirt suit and pearls. Her choral-lipsticked mouth was contorted in fury. She kept going. ‘I’ll have you arrested! I’ll call the police!’
I struggled to right myself, dusted myself off, rubbed my thigh where the bike had fallen on it and mumbled something about unprovoked assault. I was only then I noticed her husband. He was a tall, boney man in a trench coat with thinning grey hair. He had a long pointed brolly which he’d tucked under his arm and he was stooping down, gathering up my scattered papers and pushing them back into my bag. Under his breath he was apologising to no one in particular in that strange repetitive way certain English people do when whatever they’re apologising about about is clearly not their fault. They just want it to end.
Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry.
My shock was replaced by sudden indigence, but this was was quickly washed away by a hot wave of shame. Pearls Lady kept on shouting and pointing at me and as she did, people began to gather round. It was becoming an actual scene. A couple of onlookers clucked with disapproval (I wasn’t sure at whom) and a young rickshaw driver asked if I was alright. I was, as it happened, but I didn’t have a chance to say so because Pearls Lady was on a role.
‘Absolutely appalling behaviour! You’re lucky there aren’t any bobbies around! They’ll throw you straight in jail!’
I was pretty sure she was wrong about this, but my god she was so emphatic. In my shock I began to wonder if there was something I was missing. Some loophole in London traffic law that allowed enraged pedestrians to push over cyclists for bending minor rules. I couldn’t be sure. Finally her husband pushed my bag into my shaking hands. As he did we shared a brief, furtive moment of eye contact. I wanted to thank him. I meant to thank him. But instead I said the first thing that came to my head which was, ‘God, how can you stand her?’
He winced. I regretted it immediately.