BlackNotBlack.com

A London New Year's that Wasn't

Buddhists and quantum physicists will tell you with utter certainty that time is an illusion, but I believe counting the days has concrete rewards, and that New Year’s celebrations are one of them. Although I’ve been fortunate enough to be stationed at ground zero for some of the biggest parties in the world—from SXSW in Austin to Carnival in Rio—I’ve never really celebrated western New Year’s in grand style. On two occasions I was in the Caribbean, on three I was in Los Angeles, and I spent one uneventful New Year’s in the coach section of a United flight from Spain, pathetic as that seems. But I’ve never rung in the New Year with fireworks, champagne, and a hundred thousand people screaming, dancing, and swapping kisses.

This year I decided London was the ticket.

London’s official celebration, a gargantuan fireworks display that draws multitudes, takes place on the River Thames with the famous London Eye as the backdrop. I really meant to attend this event, but a funny thing happened on the way to London—I ended up in Hastings with friends. Clearly Hastings is no London, however it is historically significant. As anyone who retains a sliver of high school history somewhere in their brain can tell you, it was the site of the Battle of Hastings in 1066, the most decisive Norman victory in the Norman conquest of England.

On October 13th of that year a French army led by William of Normandy clashed with English warriors led by Harold II. There are numerous conflicting accounts concerning the battle, but the long and short of it is that the English lost the next day after Harold was killed. Some versions have him cleanly slain, while others have him felled and subsequently decapitated, de-legged, and de-everythinged by the savage French, who apparently intended to dice him up for mauviette pie. My friend Davis (not his real name) summed the entire event up in a deadpan I found quite comical, though I’m not entirely sure he meant it that way: “They fought, Harold was killed, arrow in the eye, French win.”

These days Hastings is a beachy seaside town, heavily trafficked in summertime by London tourists. My friends had in mind a New Year’s pub crawl, but as often happens with pub crawls, we lacked the will (and coordination) to continue after bar number two. So while masses of hearty souls braved chill temperatures to watch fireworks detonate above the London Eye, I was in a pub in Hastings, where the last fireworks were in 1066. While I didn’t have the Eye or the pyrotechnics, I did have excellent company and saw several men you’d think would possess more dignity reenact the stripping scenes from The Full Monty. Lacking the French killer instinct, I couldn’t muster the nerve to photograph their doughy cavorting. But my girlfriend, bless her evil heart, felt no such qualms.

Sometime in the deep a.m. the festivities shifted to Davis’s (still not his real name) and his girlfriend Naomi’s (op.cit.) flat and evolved into an all night drug party, which is why I’m not using their real names. This was something of a surprise, even though the last time I saw the two, Davis dosed me with what he called a “Jesus cookie.” It’s a funny story, actually. He asked me if I’d like a Jesus cookie, but I only heard the word “cookie.” It tasted like a regular cookie. Forty minutes later I achieved geostationary orbit approximately 350 kilometers above the planet.

Two days after Hastings I found myself in London, too late for the fireworks, but not too late to sip the dregs of New Year’s by riding the London Eye. While my friends waited patiently below, my girlfriend and I went up for the bargain price of fifteen pounds each—about sixty dollars total, folks. Still, if the chance arises to ride this marvelous contraption, I recommend it. The Eye is an engineering miracle, unlike any other ferris wheel in the world. The view from the top is what you’d expect, with London laid out like electric embroidery from horizon to horizon. But as beautiful and gaudy as the panorama is, and as spectacular as the New Year’s fireworks must have been, I’m certain nothing could have been more entertaining than the night in Hastings with friends (and their drugs).

As for attending a big league New Year’s party, I guess I’ll have to try again next year.

Labels: hastings, london, london eye, travel

posted by Egan Ehlers @ 4:40 PM