Hannah Gumbrielle | Staff Writer
On my way to Heathrow to catch my flight home, I was struggling to think what advice I would give to someone spending a summer in London, but then it hit me. It very literally hit me. A woman, who I can only imagine mistook her wheelie suitcase for a Ferrari, attempted to run me over with her carry-on luggage. Right then, I knew my advice would be to never stand to the left in London. Keep to the right of escalators, of queues, of staircases, everywhere. I foolishly forgot that the left side is the fast lane, the lane for people who don’t have time to eat breakfast but rather wolf down a deskfast at their laptop. People who own and actually use weekly planners and have iPhones that would have to be surgically removed from their hand. However, these are the kind of people who will inevitably be your boss if you decide to work in London, as I did. These people will make your time there unbelievable or unbearable, so choose your left hand lane person wisely. I worked with a company who were willing to put up with me for two summers in a row, so I like to think I chose well.
These people will make your time there unbelievable or unbearable, so choose your left hand lane person wisely
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My advice would be to get lost. Trust me when I say turn off Data Roaming and get what’s called a “map”, clever things that are like the GPS on your phone but printed on paper, and wander around for so long you wear away the soles of your shoes. It’s only by getting hopelessly and so wonderfully lost that I have found bookshops and cafes hidden away in lanes so picturesque they could be the album art of the next cool band you’ve never heard of. Through my wanderings I even found a bar with a fridge for a front door and served Fawlty Towers-themed cocktails. Needless to say, I made it my priority to quickly make friends with the bartender.
Which is why my advice would be to never underestimate being nice. London is ironically unsociable despite being as densely populated as it is. This can be easily seen by observing a packed carriage on the Underground, all the passengers of which are desperately trying to avoid any kind of eye contact.
Rather sadly, it is also worth noting that London runs on building up contacts and people simply remember you if you’re nice. Offer to open doors, help with bags and be generally pleasant and watch a stranger’s face light up with all the surprise and joy of a corgi on stilts. Who knows, by making friends with a bartender who can make a killer ‘Basil-No-Fawlty’, they may even bring you 70% tequila and you may even get so drunk you ask a letterbox for directions to Bloomsbury.
My advice would be to learn how to just do something. Yes, I know a lot of people’s definition of hell is talking to a stranger on the phone, but telling your boss you can’t ring up a company because you’re “the epitome of the socially awkward penguin meme” is not a legitimate excuse. I was once asked to pick up some DVDs from a film awards office on my first day, a task which involved going to the epicentre of dodgey Soho sex shops and buzz up to an office just above an Ann Summers. Just start by doing one thing out of your depth and everything will get progressively easier in comparison. I can’t be intimidated by the gaze of several trenchcoat-clad men in red neon light and I’m damn proud of that, therefore I can talk to anyone over the phone without having to internalize a panic attack.
My advice is to realize just how long you’re going for. Despite what your mother says, you do not need all those extra pairs of socks.
You don’t need to bring the entire Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy series just because you envisaged yourself reading them in a trendy Covent Garden café.
Pack light and keep in mind you’re never further than 50 meters from a Boots or a Pret-a-Manger at any given time. You can get anything you want at all hours, which rather dangerously incudes several companies that will deliver pizza and/or booze to your door until 7am. Unfortunately, the same goes for people. A Ryanair flight is unpleasant enough without mascara running down your face because a song came on in the departures lounge that reminded you of someone.
After all of you time in London, don’t be surprised if you come home with a strange impatience. You’ll find yourself getting unreasonably angry with people who walk slowly. Waiting for 3 minutes for a train to Brixton was bad to begin with, but 40 minutes for a DART to Bray is unbearable. Suddenly, you’ve noticed you’ve skipped breakfast and now only eat deskfast. You’ve bought a weekly planner and your phone has begun to fuse to your hand. You’ve become that person who rushes down the left hand side of the escalators and runs straight into someone without noticing. As I sit slightly bruised at departure gate 82 in Heathrow, trust me when I say the reason my advice was to never stand to the left in London is because if you do, you won’t be able to stand it when you’ve left London. 
