The South Africans got me back.<\/p>\n
You see the District Line splits, and you’ve got to get the right train.\u00c2\u00a0 And, at Embankment, the CIRCLE Line runs on the same track.\u00c2\u00a0 So it was confusing.\u00c2\u00a0 And I asked for help.<\/p>\n
The first guy had to take off his iPod headphones.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s one thing the mobile companies will never realize, the iPod is COOL!\u00c2\u00a0 We’re selling cool in the music business, don’t ever forget it.<\/p>\n
And this hipster said this was a Circle Line train, just as I was about to get on, so I backed off.<\/p>\n
And that’s when I quizzed the South Africans.\u00c2\u00a0 Not that I knew they were South African, they ultimately told me.\u00c2\u00a0 Brothers actually, one staying with a THIRD brother in East Putney, planning to reside for five years to get a U.K. passport, the other living in BERLIN!\u00c2\u00a0 You see with a South African passport you can’t go many places, you need a visa, it’s a hassle.\u00c2\u00a0 But the Berlin brother didn’t care.\u00c2\u00a0 He LOVES Germany.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s a festival every weekend.\u00c2\u00a0 There are parties.\u00c2\u00a0 He doesn’t want to leave, even though eventually his IT job for a U.K. company will end.<\/p>\n
It’s just that…everybody outside the U.S. is so WORLDLY!\u00c2\u00a0 Will went on vacation to Sri Lanka.\u00c2\u00a0 Harry’s leaving for Tobago on Saturday.\u00c2\u00a0 In the U.S. a trip is to Palm Springs.\u00c2\u00a0 As for investigation, most Americans go to New York and don’t even SEE most of the country!<\/p>\n
And the text messaging.\u00c2\u00a0 We’re still living in the world of e-mail in the U.S.\u00c2\u00a0 People text instead of call here.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s a service called AQA, Any Question Answered, that will text you back the answer to like…\u00c2\u00a0 Well Will asked them who I was, and they came up with, as they say here, a proper answer.<\/p>\n
And on the tube on the way to Camden Town, I was a bit freaked by the gap between the platform and the train.\u00c2\u00a0 But, when the voice came over the speakers when the car arrived, saying MIND THE GAP, I suddenly knew what inspired that great Soundtrack Of Our Lives song.<\/p>\n
In Camden Town I met Kumi.\u00c2\u00a0 Who took me to the Camden Market.\u00c2\u00a0 Ever wonder where they get all those clothes in the videos?\u00c2\u00a0 Want to look like you emerged from the cover of "Ziggy Stardust"?\u00c2\u00a0 Well, here you can buy the boots and the outfits, it’s Halloween 24\/7.\u00c2\u00a0 And they’re selling vinyl, and posters.\u00c2\u00a0 What can I tell you, in Camden Market it’s still the sixties.<\/p>\n
And then off to a pub with Kumi and Mao for lunch.<\/p>\n
It was like watching one of those films, of the forties.\u00c2\u00a0 On one side of the street there was the factory and on the other the living quarters.\u00c2\u00a0 You could just PICTURE it, even though now the living quarters were offices and the factory space had been converted into a generalized commercial space and contained a pub.<\/p>\n
I mean we’re sitting there on couches, eating our sandwiches, having an intellectual conversation the likes of which I haven’t experienced in the 21st century.\u00c2\u00a0 Kumi has an MBA, and works at Getty Images.\u00c2\u00a0 Mao has a master in physics, but chucked it all to play the bass.\u00c2\u00a0 Kumi spoke of how in the U.S. it’s all about accumulation, and in the rest of the world it’s not that way.\u00c2\u00a0 In the U.K. REPUTATION is important.\u00c2\u00a0 And in Japan, the company treats you like a family, and the disparity between rich and poor is microscopic compared to my homeland.<\/p>\n
It was mind-bending.\u00c2\u00a0 We think we know everything until we travel, until we’re confronted with something different.<\/p>\n
So now I’m rushing off to the Chat Room thing.\u00c2\u00a0 Someone sent me the definition of Chatham House Rules, and it said you just can’t quote with attribution.\u00c2\u00a0 But after my piece last night, as it was put to me, everybody had their knickers in a twist, fearful I’d reveal their truth, so there will be no report.\u00c2\u00a0 In the parlance of surfers, in the words of great rock and rollers everywhere, like me, seeing the original Ziggy Stardust tour at the Music Hall in Boston, you had to be there.\u00c2\u00a0 At least that’s the way it’ll be after it’s all done!<\/p>\n
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The South Africans got me back. You see the District Line splits, and you’ve got to get the right train.\u00c2\u00a0 And, at Embankment, the CIRCLE Line runs on the same track.\u00c2\u00a0 So it was confusing.\u00c2\u00a0 And I asked for help. The first guy had to take off his iPod headphones.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s one thing the mobile […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-182","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music-business"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-2W","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=182"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}