Something That Happened a Little While Ago.

Living just next to Bishopsgate, one of the City's financial centres and home of RBS, we were warned to stay away from the area during the week of the G20 Meltdown etc...but it was to much of a mega photo opp. The ones above are a few of my favourites that I took that day.

So I walked down Commercial Street and peeked (literally) round the corner onto Brushfield Street expecting to see mass rioting, bloodshed and a bomb in my face. Instead, I saw 5 million policemen standing around RBS looking at each other.

Assessing the situation with the model Jess Harris has taught me with her risk assessment skills, I came to the conclusion it would be completely safe to proceed down the street and onto Bishopsgate.  So I did.

It was so surreal - no suits anywhere, no traffic, no buses, just fairly amused looking people wandering around. I bump into someone I know, and he tells me that the temporarily undercover bankers have all left their buildings and are at the pub, drinking on their businesses money while 5,000 others protest against 5,000 different causes. 

The guy leaves, and I was swept up through the wall of police into the middle of the Climate Camp. There was an atmosphere, but an entirely peaceful one. People sharing food, face paint and a man and mega phone with people crowded around listening to what he had to say. 

Before I could fully process what was happening, I let a smiling hippy stick a large sticker on my back saying 'Capitalism means war'. 

I elect to keep my BlackBerry in my pocket.

News reaches me and my new environmentalist friends that the front of a branch of RBS has been smashed, and that protests at Bank have turned a little nasty. I decide to leave while everyone was still being nice to me and the Sun was still shining. 

I called Pa to let him know I survived and hopped on the tube to Elephant and Castle to go and see my favourite Californian, all the while receiving slightly nervous looks from commuters. 

In retrospect, it must have been the anti-capitalist war declaration stuck to my back. Oops. 

It was a good day, I like being where history is in the making.