8/6/2022 0 Comments A Night In The Cells Pt. 1Now this is a different tone, isn't it. Recently, I had the astute pleasure of spending a night in the old bill hotel, otherwise known as Holborn Police Station. It's a funny thing being arrested in broad daylight in the middle of Oxford Street, London. Something about the thousands of shoppers wandering up and down, aimlessly meandering amongst the sprawl of high end stores and fashion boutiques adds to the embarrassment of it all. Such a calm and unsuspecting scene, sliced down the middle by a sheepish looking Lonesome Wanderer being herded into the back of a bully van by four fully armed Metropolitan Police Officers. At 5:30 on a Thursday evening no less. Now I'm sure you're scrambling for your wits and questioning your very eyes. "Sorry WHAT!? You got nicked!?". And the answer is yes, yes I did. Read on to find just why I did, and how bizarre and introspective I found the situation to be. Stop Right There!Song recommendations for while you read! Add these to a queue before you start and let your streaming platform do the rest:
Let's get into it! As I mentioned, it was 5:30 on a Thursday evening. The sun was shining on London, which is a rare sight to say the least. I had bunked off of work early to enjoy said sunshine, and fancied a bit of shopping. In particular, I was in search of some white canvas trousers and some tank tops, as is the summer fashion of today. Strolling into a Uniqlo without a care in the world, I source my purchases with ease and pay for them at the till. The efficiency was blinding and I was very impressed with myself. With my mission accomplished I headed for the door, back out into the blazing sunshine, when I'm greeted with a series of beeps from the security barriers. I thought nothing of it and proceeded on my merry way, before receiving a sharp tap on the shoulder. Turning around I spot the shop security guard, who smiles and asks if I could kindly walk back through the barriers. With nothing to fear, I grumble and agree, ambling back to the shop and once again passing through the gates to Fort Knox. Once again, a cacophony of accusatory beeps erupts around me. The security guard smiles again and asks to look in my bag, to which (of course) I tell them is no problem. They take me to the back to save my embarrassment. The manager walks in and they found that the person at the till had left the damned security tag on, which they then took off for me, before proceeding to fish around in my bag for clues of mal-intent. Before I know it, my life flashes before my eyes. "Stop!" I exclaim, to which their response was an abject look of confusion. "Be careful, I've just remembered I have a knife in my bag". The smile that once sat on their face was immediately replaced by what could only be described as a heavy cocktail of fear and adrenaline. They stood up straight, scratching their heads and muttering "oh shit" under their breath. The guard turns to me and says, "sorry mate, we're going to have to call the police". My heart sinks like a stone and I yell out, "There's no need to do that! I can explain! I'm not trying to stab you am I?" I was promptly informed it was of no matter. I had been found in possession of a fixed blade, pointed object in central London, and when it comes to London, they do not fuck about when it comes to knives. The guard speaks into his radio and in about 4 seconds flat the small room is swarming with security, wild eyed and ready to go like I was some kind of animal with the intent to shank them in the armpit and make off with thousands of pounds worth of CCTV equipment. Now to put it lightly, confused and concerned reader, I was absolutely shitting myself. I was herded into an even deeper back room which, when the door was swung open, was full to the brim with trainee staff, seemingly on their induction. What an exciting start to a job, I thought. We swing back around and find some kind of a service corridor off to the side, which I'm promptly hurled into and directed towards a lonesome plastic chair, the likes of which you'd find in a secondary school gymnasium on exam day. Now you would be fair to ask: "What the fuck were you doing carrying a knife?" and to answer that very question I want to take you back to the afternoon previously, Wednesday. The Afternoon Previously, Wednesday This will become more relevant later oIt had been a long time since I'd seen my dear friend Eilidh. Over a year in fact. The last time, I had been in the middle of a 2 day bender and was still partying at 8AM in my kitchen. She called me, told me she had a free ticket to a Jazz festival in Cambridge and asked if I'd like to join her . Of course, my immediate response was yes, and so I headed straight out the door and had an amazing weekend. But anyway, that's a story for another time. I realised it had been too long, and so I reached out and asked if Eilidh was in London, to which she replied she was. I offered her out to St. James' Park for a picnic. I took the responsibility of sourcing the grub, and Eilidh took the responsibility of showing up on time, which of course she didn't. Rushing out of my house, late as I usually am, I had my picnic basket and blanket in one hand and a gesture of frustration in the other. I think to myself, "but there will be chorizo, there will be bell peppers and let's not forget there will be Pitta bread! What ever will I cut them with?". I grabbed the closest thing I could find, which just so happened to be a camping knife with a sheath. Slinging it into the basket, I flew out of the front door and ran for my train. A beautiful picnic it was too. The sun was shining, and a wandering bloke with a polaroid camera asked for some change for a snap. I didn’t have any cash, but Eilidh did and so we got a cute picnic picture in the park. This will become more relevant later on. So yes, I had a knife because I went to a picnic, which puts into perspective how ridiculous the following situation is. Now let's head back to the hallways of Uniqlo and the bucket load of security guards. In The Midst of ItBewildered at the fuss and sweating profusely, I sat back in my chair and assessed the situation. I knew that I'd done nothing wrong, but I would say that wouldn’t I? I had a fire door directly in front of me, stairs up to my left and exits at either end of the hallway. The idea flashed across my mind: I could make it out of that fire door and leg it, however I didn’t fancy having my face mashed against the pavement, especially not in this heat. After a short while, yet more heavily hi-vis'd security personnel rocked up and my chance at escape was lost. Like a wild dog surrounded by the pest squad, I was penned in with no chance of escape. At this point, I resigned myself to my fate and began studying the faces of those around me. Firstly, there was the short wannabe gangster who simply would not shut up. I could tell he was loving this, and he kept trying to give me sermons about a better way to live my life. He would occasionally turn to the cute doorwoman who had started this whole debacle and start talking about knives like he was a Navy Seal, born and raised in obscurity with a need to fend for himself on the streets, no doubt to impress her. He came off sickeningly patronising and I thought him to be quite the bellend. Then there was the Oxford street security, who roam around looking for trouble. The first guy was unassuming, but the second looked to be of Eastern European descent, about 15ft tall with a magnificent blonde ponytail. He looked like the kind of guy that would go head to head with a silverback gorilla and return from the jungle shirtless and sipping on an ice cold can of Coors Lite, hand in hand with the silverback's wife. As it happens, he was the nicest guy in there. There was also the doorwoman who had stopped me in the first place. There was nothing too exciting about her apart from a pretty great mullet. Finally, there was the manager, who initially found the knife. I can tell he believed my story and he just looked sorry for me, which was fine because I felt pretty sorry for myself too. We sat there waiting for the old bill to rock up, and like in any major city where heavy duty knife crime is prevalent, they took forever. By the time an hour and a half had passed, we were all getting fidgety. The security were talking about the various crime they'd defended the British public against (such as the theft of hairbands and the smoking of crack in the bathroom, amongst other things), and I was sat there thinking on repeat about the fact my life was over and that jail was going to be my home for the next 4000 years. I jest, but it really was an awful, soul-crushing and helpless feeling that I would only wish on my worst enemy, and maybe a couple of my exes. At long last, the feds showed up, armed to the teeth and with the same wide-eyed look on their faces that the others had previously. I don’t blame them to be honest, if you looked at me, you would be greeted by one of the most hardened criminals you've ever had the displeasure of laying your eyes on. The cops sat with me for a while and asked me some questions, looked at the knife for about 20 minutes and gave me a good frisking. It took everything I had to not say "Ooo, steady on officer 😉". Somehow I don’t think it would have suited the moment. While discussing my reasons for possession of the knife, one of the officers (who were pretty nice actually) looked me dead in the eyes and said: "If I was you, when they ask if you want a lawyer, say yes". At this, my heart sank like a stone and I knew I was done for. It took forever for the bully van to arrive, as clearly I wasn’t threatening enough. One copper even asked me to attack him so they could movup the priority and get home quicker. I was tempted, but I politely declined. When it did arrive, everything moved pretty quickly. They stood me up, frisked me again and read me my rights. You have the right to remain silent, your Mother was a hamster and your Father smelt of elderberries. We don’t want to be here either, don’t punch me or I'll flatten you. You have the right to an attorney, please stop doing crime. Or something like that. I asked for them to not put me in handcuffs to save myself the embarrassment, and also so I'd look well hard sauntering out, arms swinging, surrounded by coppers. They agreed as "You're a real swell guy Mr. Wanderer" (not, it was because I hadn't actually stabbed anyone) and marched me outside into the blistering sun. There was little old me, surrounded by four heavily armed Metropolitan Police officers, and a whole heap of chilled out shoppers going about their business. As far as I could tell, none of them noticed how badass I looked, and I felt pretty badass for a split second. Right up until the doors of the van slammed shut behind me. I had always wondered what the inside of a police van looked like. I have had my brushes with the law in the past, but these never amounted to a full van just for me. To be honest, it's exactly as you would imagine it. Most of the van is of a pretty normal layout, apart from a small section at the very back, reserved for us vagabonds and degenerates.
There's a wall made of about 3 layers of glass and metal bars between myself and the plod, and an obnoxiously loud fan on the roof that I assumed was to prevent my suffocation before I could be brought to justice. The fan was so loud there would be no chance of some in-transit sleeping. Everything was a boring pale grey/blue colour that would make Vincent Van Gogh cut off his other ear for sure. Something I noticed was the heavy number of scuffs and scrapes across the small walls of the portable cell. You could see where, clearly, some idiot or 10 had tried their best to escape the clutches of the law, again clearly, to no avail. You would have to be quite out of your mind to think you had a chance of getting through the heavy iron walls, but I guess if you ended up in the back of one of these you usually were. We were stuck in heavy rush hour traffic, and so the drive took about half an hour longer than the 5 minutes it should have. I thought to myself: At least I had the decency to get nicked close by. Imagine if I had been in the middle of a field in Wales, where the closest police station is a 3 hour drive. That would've been awful. However, come to think of it, carrying a camping knife in the middle of a field in Wales is probably slightly more appropriate than Oxford Street. Sat in the back of the van I couldn’t help but watch the public walk around and enjoy their freedom. For a split second I understood how a prisoner must feel, not being able to do what they like, when they like. It was a savage emotion that startled me. Arriving at Holborn Police Station, I was jostled through the doors and up a slight ramp to what appeared to be the main check-in area. It was dingy, grey, and underground, meaning no natural lighting. The same as the van, the station looked just as you would expect; walls adorned with all manner of anti-crime propaganda, a big yellow telephone on the wall for calling family members or lawyers, big bars and locks and other devices of restraint dotted around the shop, and yellow markings on the floor on which you were to place your feet. Surprisingly, the Sergeant checking me in was fairly friendly. He asked me my name, address and so on, details of the knife and my arrest and whether I would like anything to drink. I asked him, looking at my case, did he think I was going to jail. His colleague to the left took one look at the knife and said 5-10 years easy. My heart sank even further than it had before. His straight face broke into a smile and he pointed out he was joking. I looked him dead in the eye and told him just how funny I found his joke, and he didn’t look mighty impressed. The Sergeant checking me in looked at me apologetically and said "listen mate, there's scumbags in here that have done much worse than you and don’t go to prison, you'll likely get a caution at the worst". This offered me some sort of relief, but the 'likely' in there didn't allow me to relax. They asked me to bag up all of my belongings and take out all of my piercings, I assume to prevent me fashioning them into some sort of shiv, and I did so. I asked if I could keep my nipple piercings in as they would heal up if I took them out, and to my surprise, they allowed it. Instantly, all of my design technology lessons at school came rushing back, and I thought of all the ways I could turn my nipples into deadly weaponry should another prisoner come at me. I was photographed and fingerprinted by a man who needed my help in operating both of those machines. I won't lie to you, I tried to look as cool and scary as I could in the picture, and to be honest I think it came off pretty well. That was it. I was documented. I was in the system. A man known to the government. Should I get up to no good in future, they'll find me in the blink of an eye. I asked for my mugshots so that I could include them in this very blog post, but he refused, stating he was unable to give me them due to some policy or other. After my photos and fingerprints were registered, I was taken to my cell. They assured me it shouldn’t take long, I just needed to have an interview and then they will either let me go or charge me. I was greeted with a surprisingly large affair with awful mustard yellow tiles, and a line of light blue tiles across the middle. They were clearly meant to add some kind of interior design element to it, however Kevin McCloud would have been appalled. There was a brick slab along one wall that would act as a bed, perched upon which was a blue waterproof mat and pillow (to be sprayed down with ease), like those you would get in P.E. at school. There was a metal toilet bowl around a small corner (I was thankful for the privacy), and a few glass bricks in the wall, letting in not nearly enough natural light. One bar across the length of one ceiling side was my only real source of light. I turned to see the heavy metal door swing shut, clanging hard against the frame. A series of locks turned such as in Gringott's Vault, and I'm left alone with my thoughts. I couldn’t help but think to myself: All of this because of a fucking picnic. Come back next week to find out about my time in a Central London jail cell, a fairly gruelling and quite terrifying experience that you really don't want to miss! All the best, The Lonesome Wanderer P.S. Well done for making it to the end! Thank you for taking the time to read the above post, below you can find 3 quotes that I thought matched the theme of this post nicely. I look forward to hearing your thoughts in the comments below! Quotes:
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AboutThe Lonesome Wanderer is a blog dedicated to all things solo travel, including the philosophical and introspective aspects involved with being on the road alone. More Posts
September 2022
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