The Only Way is Chelsea (Part 2 - The Escape)

Scurrying from the previous episode's cosy Chelsea nightspot and its preponderance of gits, we hunted for a night bus. As the four of us walked along, we found ourselves being showered with CDs. Git 5 now stumbled up, apparently considering this glass-based attack a perfect way to charm the group. Tactful Friend attempted (tactfully) to dismiss him. So tactful was she he did not notice. Unlucky Friend asserted herself with more vigour, and dispatched the yob.

The best Google Images can do on the Flying CDs front

The presence of flying CDs yet unexplained we parted ways: the rest of the group south; Kate in the Countryside striking out alone the opposite way - back to the wilds of Pimlico. 

As I waited at the bus stop, the door to the flat opposite was abruptly flung open. Two boys fell out and started picking up the remnants of the flying CDs. 


They spotted me. I pretended to be fascinated by my book ('The Rum Diary' in case anyone's interested) but it was a fragile conceit.

'Come to a party!' Oddly, this chap seemed to be Not A Git. I looked up.


'Thanks - I'm afraid I have to catch a bus. Another time.'


Undeterred, he rolled out a string of (at the time, incredibly compelling) reasons why I should attend. At last, sizing them up as non-rapists and assessing their hallway to be neither the hallway of a crack den nor a Mormon haunt, I agreed. It's the King's Road remember. What could go wrong?

Up the stairs I ventured to a flat full of people I did not know. Here I was waylaid by Pensive Git (Git 6, for those of you still counting). Pensive Git had reached the contemplative stage of his evening and decided I was the perfect person to share his revelatory mood.

First I heard about his brother and his brother's plans for the future. Soon after, I was told about his early years at boarding school and the difficulties he'd had settling in, problems that were connected in some way to cattle farming - though I may be misremembering. We then moved on to a breakdown of his life objectives and career goals. He has a job interview in a couple of days and is planning to move into asset management, in case you were wondering. At this stage, he had yet to ask my name. However, since I'd just stumbled into the party of a bunch of people I'd never met, I couldn't really complain that the company wasn't up to scratch.

As he took to categorising the life lessons he'd learned up to and including tonight, he began to fumble at my knee. I realised at this stage that it was time to go. Hailing NAG, I announced my intention and thanked him for his hospitality. His enthusiasm was overwhelming, badly expressed - 'It's been seminal!' - and frankly quite sweet. Unfortunately Pensive Git seemed to believe my departure a come on.

'I'm leaving too!' he exclaimed. He groped for my name. 'Er... I'll show you, her, out yeah. Yeah. Bye then NAG.' He paused to embrace his old schoolfriend and, seizing my chance, I darted for the door.

Seminal indeed.

Newsflash: Former Tenant on the Rampage

I've just been on the phone to BOF. That's right, this is Breaking News from Kate in the Countryside.

Today at lunchtime BOF popped back for five minutes, just to check on the coffee-machine you understand. He opens the main downstairs door into an ill-parked pram and is overwhelmed by awkwardness when the child inside squawks its dismay. This turns to near-hysterical embarrassment when he is also greeted by the bottom of a bent-over thirty-year-old woman. She is at the foot of the stairs, scrabbling through the cumulated post of our building. 

True, we have not yet managed to contrive sugar-borrowing visits to meet every single one of our neighbours, but this is decidedly not a woman known to BOF. In fact, he is fairly confident that she does not live here. 


She straightens. She is looking for post for Flat C. Interestingly, that is where we live. As awkwardness reaches fever pitch, BOF fights temptation to turn and run, realising who this single mother must be....


None other than our evicted predecessor, one Bonny Umekwe. The provider of fraudulent references. The woman against whom all of our locks were (so the estate agent told us) changed. In an astonishing fit of bravery BOF admits that we have taken Bonny's post to the estate agent, so that they could forward it to her. Our fraudulent friend swears. She is not on the best terms with our estate agent.


'Sorry,' offers BOF. Suddenly his lunchtime cappuccino seems an unnecessary extravagance. Backing out, he returns calmly to work.

Down and Out in London (Part 2)

... Continued from here.

In Shoreditch, even the adverts are trendy.

And so to Wandsworth, only moments away on the Overground. While our flat-hunt originally centred on trendy Shoreditch, these days we're grateful for any viewings at all, anywhere. Our one stipulation ('not Clapham') has started to look a little shortsighted, now that we're practically in Portsmouth.

Oddly we're shown a home suited to a young family with child. We have none. But the estate agent's rather good-looking and BOF is delighted ('No we're not together, no…' he comments - indicating me - when she asks if he'd like a glass of water). Katy the good-looking estate agent says that she's had offers on the place but she's holding it in case we're interested (BOF: '… because she fancies me'). 

We don't want it. She knows we don't want it. We don't want to say we don't want it, because it is so great, and it has a cellar. So we chat about the area and BOF gets her number. (From me.) So convincing is our spiel, we almost make ourselves believe we can afford it.

In Oval, we wander tentatively down the Brixton Road. There seem to be hundreds of flats advertised all over the place. Confidently, we march into an estate agent's. Fourteen people sit typing without pause. Clearly processing millions of perfect flats for us. 

Brixton: Flat Mecca?

'Hello, we're looking for a 2 bed flat, for around £300 a week in this area.'

'No.'

'Er, sorry?' (We laugh, feeling a bit awkward.)

'There's no flats available at all.'

'Nowhere in London?'

'No.'

'How about if we…?'

'There's nothing. Sorry.' (He turns away. The thirteen others eye us malevolently.)

'Perhaps if you took our details…?'

'Really?'

'Er.'

'Oh OK. We'll let you know if anything ever comes in.' (General laughter.)

BOF: 'Goody.'

Friday night sees us at another grafittied door. Inside it is lovely, if you ignore the odd stains by the toilet, and one of the beds. The couple living there are charming also, though not (of course) in charge of the rental process. 

We rue the precious flat-hunting minutes spent on small talk but leave happily, passing two frowning middle-aged women on the steps, holding notepads.

'This place couldn't be less suited to them,' we chortle, secure in our momentary, East-London-lent chic.

Outside we debated whether to call the estate agent immediately to take it. Surely impolite, we worried. It's a Friday night. These people are not bankers, they're estate agents. 

So we call early the following day. The middle-aged women have put down a deposit. They are going to live in our Shoreditch flat. The estate agent will let us know if anything changes. (But it's unlikely to.)

Homeless once more.

Down and Out in London

Fleet-footed followers of Kate in the Countryside who read last week's Censored Episode will have learnt that I've got a job in London. But finding somewhere to live in the Big + Scary City is proving problematic. Flats put up for rent on Gumtree are being taken within three hours of being posted. And not by me. I have a flatmate, a salary and a coffee machine,* but nowhere to place these articles. 

My best friend / Belligerently Optimistic Future-flatmate (BOF) had made detailed plans for flat-hunting. Clutching an A-Z (his) and meticulously typed list of potential flats (mine), we arrived twenty minutes early for our first appointment near Victoria Park, both wearing our smartest coats. As we crossed the road to get to it, a man in a van drove past. 

'Watch out you don't get stabbed in there,' he called gaily. 

We stepped over half a bike and a pile of vomit and climbed the stairs inside.

'My brother's knocking this place down after Christmas, falling apart a bit,' said a man called Jim who was showing us round. 'It'll be great when it's all been redone again though, he's going to make a mint.'

Trendy...

I had never been inside a crack den before. 

BOF looked around dispiritedly. He finds flattery the best and easiest form of small talk and I could tell that even he was struggling here. 

'Windowsill's a bit rotten,' pointed out Jim, looking uncomfortable.

'Er yes. Um … (pacing around) Gosh … what a great kitchen,' BOF ventured helpfully. 

Worried that his fear of offending Jim would extend to his placing a deposit on the den, I suggested we leave, unfortunately forgetting to avoid the vomit on the way out.

But not to worry, an appointment in Canada Water came next. 

It had started to rain fairly persistently. At this, BOF explained that he'd read that drizzle was the perfect weather for viewing flats - 'Means you get a realistic impression of the place Kate.'

There are only two reasons you'd be in Canada Water: if you were trying out the shiny new East London line (it is rather good) and got out on a whim, or if you already live there, having failed to see the place before putting down a deposit. The best thing I can say for our visit is that it prevented such an error.

Canada Water Station:
making up for something?

Fred the estate agent had generously offered to drive us to the flat, so we met him at the shiny station. Racing out, he fled to his car as we struggled to keep up. Head jutted forward, Fred didn't stride, but instead took the car park with a series of rapid tiny steps, like a chunky little ballet dancer. 

'I've been told I walk quite fast,' he observed.

His pace is the pace of a man trying to rent out flats in Canada Water. It is a suburban desert, broken up only by the occasional zebra crossing and small, crying child. The house - with its hanging wires and collapsed sofas - added to the brutally lonely feel.

'Great to have some outside space,' enthused BOF. 

When we told Fred we'd walk back to the station he looked defeated. We would see the area after all.

To be continued…

*NOTE: The coffee machine is actually imaginary at this point. But I know exactly which one I want.