Lest I forget: student's life in London

My life as a student in London back in the mid 1970's was nothing much to to tell. I guess that life was just school/classes and home. Classes usually started at 8 in the morning and ended at 4 in the evening. When I lived in Finsbury park, I had to leave early and queued at the bus stop along side regular office goers. Most time i did not get on the bus until the the fourth one came. The buses were regular but they were always full. It was much easier when I lived in Highbury Corner. I was more in control of my schedule. I only had to walk for 20 minutes to my classes, taking short cuts. The only bus that passed my house to my classes was number 270. It ran on 20 minutes schedule and always full.

I walked through the church garden and a short jump across a duck pond and I arrived at my classes. Some of my classmates had to take a few buses or change a few trains to get to classes. I was so lucky to live near my school and all the convenience. I lived just off Holloway Rd. I walked past the Polytechnic of Central London (PCL) almost everyday to the nearest grocery shop. (I think PCL now is called Royal Holloway University).

What did we eat? I think for breakfast I had whatever was available and ate lunch at school. Most of the time, on the way back from school, I stopped at the fish and chips shop and bought a takeaway. I stopped too often there and my woolen coat smelt like fish. Beside the regular fish and chips I had burgers in the fridge for supplement.

We had our milk delivered twice a week. I not am too sure which kind i had the gold top or the silver top. The gold top i think had heavier cream. We put our empty milk bottles outside the door and get a new bottle of milk when the milkman passed our route. We left money by the bottles when it was the time to pay.

To heat my room, the landlord installed an electric heater. The old man also gave me a propane heater in case I needed more warmth. The truck that sell propane came every week. The landlord would buy for me if i put my can outside the door. I paid for the propane.

I went to Woodgreen or Finsbury park to get halal meats from a Pakistani shop. I bought enough to last me a few days. I bought my other groceries at Sainsbury's on Holloway Road. I went to the Pakistani corner shop if I ran out of things. The corner shop charged double.

My life as a student revolved around classes and home and what to eat. I did not have a lot of money to spare. I only went to central London once a fortnight just to browse around or watch movies at Leicester Sq. Some weekends I went to the park walked and watch people in St. James park or just walked by the Thames.

I did go to the Kew garden for a couple of times because they had a lot of tropical plants. I managed to bring home some daun karapole and pandan (curi of course). There was not many places that sold oriental food. Perhaps i did not find them. I only knew one place that I could get belacan, sepat kering and durian etc. at this small Penang Chinese grocery shop down in Kilburn. I can't remember its name, but I went there when I needed my supply, not that I cooked much. I think the little shop now is a huge supermarket.

What else did we do? oh, we attended parties at friends' houses and celebrated new year at Trafalgar Sq.

I was a loner and i did not have many friends and kept much to myself. I observed that Malysians tend to stick together. I did stick with a few friends, but most of the time I was by myself and my flatmate. I kena kutuk with my friends who were waiting for a bus after school because i chose to walk home with a matsalleh classmate. I made some friends at school, including one from Ghana, one from Turkey, one from Australia. Local students seemed to avoid foreign students. I also made friend with my tutor who liked to give tutorial at the Hospital where he worked, a one to one tutorial. So after tutorial, i would walk to SOAS just to read Malaysian newspapers and to read some old Malay manuscripts.

My computer lecturer was unhygienic, he would bring his long french bread minus the wrapper or bag to class and put it on the table and started to teach. He would use his saliva on his fingers to clean the white board. Then after class he would pick his bread and go.