Experiencing England: Three Decades Apart

I just returned from an eleven-day trip (flight time included) with my wife to England. Everything went smoothly and we experienced nice weather in England while Super Typhoon Kong-rey bashed my country, Taiwan, just days ago. We boarded our return flight after Kong-rey was gone and had a happy landing in Taoyuan last evening, as scheduled. How lucky we were!

As a longtime English reader and a marathoner-turned English literature lover, I admire the history and culture of England and the UK as a whole. This was my first sightseeing trip to England. However, it's not my first trip there. I first visited London in 1993, and returned in each of the following two years. These were all business trips that I made in my tenure as what they called a "flying canvasser" for a renowned shipping line based in Japan.

As part of my preparation for the trip, I tried to locate my old passport or photo albums that might bring back those old memories of my previous three business trips to London, but I couldn't find any. Finally, I accessed our Immigration Agency website and downloaded the record of my "Exit and Entry Dates". Looking at these dates, the old memories of my younger self all came back: a newlywed and a careerman in his mid-thirties, ambitious and proud, made overseas business travel every month. As these records reveal, I made 60 overseas business trips during my 6 year tenure with the job. I have to confess, though, that now as a retiree rarely going abroad, these distant memories look surreal to me.

So, this was my fourth trip to London, but the first three were made three decades ago, and they were all business and short (three-day stay each), so my old memories were limited to only the airport, the hotel and the office, plus certain iconic spots of the City of London, and, not least, the Tube, that I used to get around during the short stay. In particular, I remember well the Tube stations Piccadilly and Oxford Circus.

On the other hand, it was the very first trip to England for my wife Jessica. During the trip she recorded a detailed travel log on Facebook that I also supplemented with my findings, so in this blog post I'll cover only some general thoughts and reflections.

First and foremost: the changes and the constants. Among the many changes that I could tell, the most evident one is the greater ethnic diversity of London. I was surprised that during our stay in London this time, most people around us spoke to one another in various languages other than English. I could not tell what languages they spoke, but I suppose they were European, African and Asian (Indian and Turkish, amomg others). The other change, and a constant as well, is London's role as one of the world's financial centers. When I visited London in the nineties, the Prime Minister was John Major. At that time China just reopened its market (after the June Fourth Incident) to the world and Hong Kong was still a British colony, London, along with Tokyo and New York, was the financial centers of the world. Thirty years on, London and New York remain the world's financial centers, with Tokyo replaced by Singapore and Hong Kong (both were former British colonies).

Just this morning, I read an article about Kemi Badenoch, 44, new leader of the U.K. Conservative Party. She was born in London to Nigerian parents, and is the first black woman to head a major British party, replacing Rishi Sunak, the first Prime Minister of Asian descent. To this end, the UK is more ethnically diverse than I had previously perceived. Badenoch is the fourth female leader of the Conservatives, after Margaret Thatcher, Teresa May and Liz Truss, all serving as the UK Prime Minister, and after stepping down, both Thatcher and Truss visited Taiwan.

The other notable constant, also what London is famous for, was the countless historical buildings and relics that have been well preserved and maintained. As I recalled, I hadn't visited any of them (except walking past) during my previous business trips, and this time we had wonderful exploration of them, though only a tiny part due to time constraints (six-day stay in London). Then, here comes the other constant: the iconic Tube that started operating in 1863. The third constant is high costs of living. However, Jessica was fascinated when she "discovered" fresh, large and appealing mushrooms sold for just one pound sterling per KG at a local market.

So, for my wife the experiences were brand new, and for me they were mixed, old and new, but one thing that was absolutely new for us both was using the 7-Day Pass (Oyster Card) and the One Day Pass, issued by TfL (Transport for London), the government agency established under The Greater London Authority (GLA). With the passes, we explored most of Inner London and also covered four Outer London Boroughs, using the Tube and various modes of transport operating under supervision of TfL. During our stay in London we visited 14 out of the 33 autonomous districts (boroughs and cities) under GLA which I had completely no idea about before the trip.

Though I'm not a foodie and can be easily satisfied with simple food, experiencing local cuisine is an important part of leisure travel for me. In fact, during previous business trips, I mostly had my meals at the hotel where I stayed, partly due to time constraints. I did dine out with colleagues—some local to the UK and others, like me, from overseas—at large function dinners, which are common for international business meetings. However, I didn't try local foods outside the hotel. This time, traveling with Jessica has changed that. She is a food enthusiast with a deep knowledge of food preparation, so we explored a variety of foods at local restaurants, including chains like Pret A Manger and Costa. For dinners, we visited iconic taverns near our lodging to experience the local culture of food and drinks. This made the food experience entirely new for me.

The other brand new experience of mine in London this time was, in my new role as a member of the renowned Toastmasters Club in Taiwan, I visited Bloomsbury Speakers, one of our clubs that held regular meetings in London. Coincidentally, however, on the date of my visit  they were holding their area speech contest. While I was warmly invited to observe the exciting speech contest, I couldn't interact much with our fellow Toastmasters that night. Still, I extended my warm welcome for their future visit, if possible, to our meeting in Taiwan as well.😊

Apart from my rediscovery (and brand new experiences for my wife) in London, we also visited two cities and one town in northern England: York, Scarborough and Leeds. With my passion for not just the English literature but also for English history and culture, our three-day stay in York gave me totally new and  fascinating experiences.

While I knew the name of New York, USA, was  derived from York, England, I had not known details of its history. Before and during the trip in England this time, I spent hour after hour researching online, and finally understood why the newly acquired land in the New World was called New York, instead of New London or other names, and some history about the city of York.

I was amazed when first stepping out of the station and viewing the City Wall of York, first built by the Romans in the 2nd century, symbolizing the military and political significance of the city. To date it remains the longest and best maintained defensive wall in the UK. We took a walk on the path and the view was simply magnificent.

For me the best part of the trip this time is the invaluable history lessons learned through both reading online and physically exploring the places. Now I understand what the Danelaw is and why York was the center of the Danelaw, and the story behind the evolution of its name: Eboracum (in Common Brittonic during Roman period), Eofowic (Old English during the Anglo-Saxon period), Jorvik (Old Norse during Viking/the Danelaw period), and finally York (English after the Norman Conquest).

On the second day of our stay in York, we traveled to Scarborough, the historic North Sea port town where the Viking leader Thorgils Skarthi raided and founded the town named after him in 966. In the 12th century,  Scarborough Castle was built, signifying the strategic importance of the location. Besides, the castle was one of the sites of the renowned medieval trade fair the Scarborough Fair, which no longer exists and is not known by most people in my country. However, when I was young I watched the film 'The Graduate', starring Dustin Hoffman and released in 1967. It's an all-time favorite of mine, largely for the theme song "Scarborough Fair" sung by Simon & Garfunkel. As such, though I had not even known the location of Scarborough before the trip, I stumbled upon it, which was surely the most nostalgic and emotional experience of mine during the trip (think about it: I first heard the song more than 50 years ago and loved it instantly, and still do to this day!❤️)

On the third day, we traveled in the opposite direction: westward to Leeds, a metropolitan city that used to look up to the east (York) in the old times. Since the Industrial Revolution, however, Leeds has developed continuously thanks to the fast-growing woolen cloth industry of which Leeds was one of the national leaders. To date, Leeds is among the most populated and prosperous (in terms of GDP) cities in Northern England, surpassing York to its east.

What intrigued me even more, though, is the Wars of the Roses, a medieval English civil war lasting 30 years and involving the House of York and the House of Lancaster. If I'm not mistaken, both York and Leeds were heavily involved in the wars, representing the opposing  camps. That will be discovered and validated further, through my next visit to (or reading the history of) northern England, which was part of what they called Britannia Inferior, the Kingdom of Northumbria, the Kingdom of England, and many others that I'm yet to learn and understand.

Finally, among the many things that we enjoyed, what my wife appreciated most was the accommodation in York, only 10 minute walk from the train station. It was the most spacious, comfortable, and, the least expensive of the three lodgings we stay at during the trip.  Another "climatic moment" for her was shopping at a local gift shop just outside the City Wall of York on the eve of our departure. The young shopkeeper greeted us enthusiastically and introduced the history behind her products in great detail and clearly spoken English. The content inside the packaging was biscuits, but it's more than biscuits with the "value" of the story and history "inside", as always.

Having visited London three times on business, I was finally able to enjoy sightseeing in England three decades later. It was such an unforgettable experience and I may need to reflect further in my future blog posts.