Know Your Baker by John M. Keller

Author:John M. Keller [Keller, John M.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dr. Cicero Books
Published: 2013-05-31T04:00:00+00:00

baggage reclaim

DURING THE SEVERAL times I had traveled to Great Britain, I was always struck, as soon as I spotted the baggage reclaim signs, by how differently two groups of people who speak the same language can view things. In the United States, new things are what is valued―new houses, new movie theater complexes, new leases on life, the New Deal, New Age, even New England, New York, New Mexico, New Hampshire, New Orleans―the regions, states and cities of the New World. The English see no reason to bulldoze a perfectly nice, hundred-year-old house, cars stay with people for decades, people shine their shoes rather than constantly buying new pairs, York and Hampshire still look about the same as they did a century ago, and suitcases and bags are meant to be preserved over time rather than replaced, so, instead of claiming your bags, you are actually always re-claiming them. In the United States, people use red ribbons and nametags not only as first lines of defense against theft but also because they are worried they might forget what their luggage looks like.

After settling into my hotel in South Ken, I found the Earl’s Court District Line tube stop and, following Ulick Martin’s directions, took it to the end of the line, Richmond, where I caught a bus that whipped me quickly across the Richmond Bridge, down through the anterior part of Twickenham’s high street and into the borough of Teddington. I had only to disembark from the bus and walk several blocks in order to find Ulick Martin’s house, implanted on the Thames River several blocks from Teddington Lock.

The cars parked along the street were strange and miniature, and their license plates looked different. What is jarring to me about other countries is most often not the things that I have never seen before at home but those things that are familiar to me but slightly different elsewhere, such as street signs, airports, spellings with slight deviations from American English, dial tones, license plates―all of which we expect to find a certain way, as when we look at a person’s picture in the newspaper or see them on television and later meet them in person and are surprised by the mutual resemblance and lack of resemblance at once.

I knocked upon the bus-red door, just below the archaic script numbers that denoted the address, and within fifteen seconds Ulick Martin himself cheerfully answered the door and gave me a hug with two pats on the back, in the Mexican style. His moustache and sideburns were composed of the same curly hairs. He had long hair and no neck and a slight squint to his eyes. He looked like a pirate without the costume. Even his “Hallo, mate” seemed less like a British salute as it did a slightly benumbed version of “Hallo, matey.” He welcomed me into his house, took my coat, offered me a cup of tea or glass of beer. I accepted the tea.

“Shame, isn’t it,” he said,

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