London Calling

Another installment in our "Mind The Gap" series. 

The high-minded "ah, one post will do" about the UK gave way to the realization that more bytes are needed to explain the current state of our British friends.

The exact moment of this realization was the immigration desk at the airport.

Terrorist threats and cyber threats are vastly exaggerated
The K-Landnews security expert knew this, but the proof of the pudding is British immigration.

They use Windows XP professional to run their terminals.

Any further questions?

Where did all the Bobbies go?
The London Underground (the subway) experienced a savage terrorist attack a few years ago.

What would the U.S. do? You know the answer if you have been to New York since 9/11. A highly visible police presence and highly annoying purse checks on the New York subway. Both achieving nothing more than catching the dumbest of wannabe terrorists while reassuring the dumbest citizens and really pissing off everybody else.

None of this in London. As a matter of fact, a street police presence that is almost negligible compared to the days of a persistent real threat out of Ireland.

The adverse impact on foreign school kids doing treasure hunts that include asking every available bobby for directions to every red telephone booth has not been studied well, worrying TheEditor just enough to include the observation in this post.

In practice, we must assume that the omnipresent CCTV cameras do a slightly better job than commonly believed.

The other practical point is that there are probably more non-uniformed police out there than you would expect.

And, the third point is that, of course, we might be wrong on the first two.

But not completely wrong.

The private coppers are a weird bunch
The one brand new Mercedes van of private coppers G4S sported a yellow sticker on the rear panel "Police Follow Me" and two even weirder "Convictions that Stick" stickers on the side. Which of these were meant to be funny eluded us. The only logical conclusion is that even British humor has developed into something more foreign than the shared language would indicate.