Overheard on the Tube (or Folks, Let's Try This Only At Home)

So, like, I was on the Tube this afternoon, y'know? And there were these, like, three American college girls sitting opposite me? And they were all, like, "Dude, what are you doing for the Fourth of July?"

"I don't know, what do you think people do here?

"Like, are you gonna get hammered?"

"Like, I don't think people get hammered here on the Fourth."

"No way, people drink here."

"I'm gonna wear red, white and blue. With stars."

"I'm gonna wear my 'Everybody Loves An American Girl' t-shirt. My mom told me people here would like me because I don't like Bush."

I was, like, so off the train at that point.

I've been in London two years now. I'm slowly realizing that my reactions to conversations like the above are far more British than American. For one, you don't talk on the Tube. You just don't. In the beginning I thought it was anti-social. Now I recognize it for the sanity-saving measure that it is.

First, Tube trains are cramped. They are a Mini Cooper to the New York subway cars' Chevy Suburban. The less reminder that you are semi-hurtling through dark, dank, rat-infested tunnels in a sardine can packed with other grumpy humans, the better.

Second, London is a loud, noisy place. The streets are full of horns, sirens, loud motors and the occasional jack hammer. The Tube creaks, groans and clacks. Conversation is just another assault on the eardrums. We don't need it, thank you very much.

Third, I've come to the conclusion that the much vaunted British politeness is basically just leaving other people the hell alone. No one is going to interrupt you, or hinder you, or get in your way. In return, they don't want to be bothered, either. In America, if you strike up a conversation in a public place where others can hear you, others may very well join in the conversation. Or even start up a new conversation, stranger to stranger. No way, Jose, in the UK. You don't speak unless spoken to, and you don't speak in tones loud enough for others to hear in public (unless, of course, you want to be overheard. The flip slide of British politeness is passive aggressiveness). So in the UK, it's just the polite thing to stay quiet, or keep your voice down.

Therefore, the only people who talk on the Tube are either 1) drunk or 2) tourists. Well, or 3) passive aggressive.

I'm not really trying to rip on the college girls, although, like, y'know, people wonder why Americans have such a bad rep abroad? Exhibit A. Don't talk about Fourth of July like it's a national holiday outside of the US. And while the Brits are not all that sensitive about Fourth of July - it was over 200 years ago, after all, it's not like they lost World War II or anything important - it does seem the height of, well, neener-neenerism to want to rub the losers' faces in it.

Oh well. I did enjoy being in the company of the girls, so fresh faced and clean-scrubbed and slightly overfed in that American way. London girls that age look a bit hard to my eyes. Their style idols are the footballers' (i.e. Team England soccer players) WAGs (Wives And Girlfriends). Victoria Beckham is their style queen, all anoxeric jutting angles and bug-eyed sunglasses and George Hamilton Mystic Tan and very expensive clothing that looks cheap (in a $2 streetwalker sense, not Target chic sense). (Can you tell I'm not a Posh - or Coleen - fan?) You can identify a London girl by her exposed bra straps and ceramic ironed hair and flashy make-up. Not there's anything wrong with any of it. It's a look. But it was...homey...to be in the presence of girls who wore make-up to accentuate, not drown, their features; whose shirts came down over their waistbands; whose skin glowed from the sun, not from the tanning bed or the bottle.