Yes I am alive and well. Thank you to all those who made contact last week to make sure I wasn’t one of the unfortunate people caught in the London terrorist attacks. Thankfully I can say that other then being mildly inconvenienced by delays to the tube since, I and everyone I know were lucky enough to have been far from any danger.

It has been a very unusual experience being in a city during a terrorist attack. It has certainly been less confronting then I would have thought it would be. Other then the day or so worth of disruption to the city that happened as a result life has pretty much just carried on as normal. It was obviously the hot topic been a topic of conversation over the weekend, but people certainly weren’t overreacting and running riot on the streets or forming lynch mobs wielding pitch forks and Union Jacks. The whole event seemed to be handled well by the authorities who had been well prepared for such an event and the general public accepted the disruptions caused and long walks home without complaining.

When riding the tube to work the morning after there was a faintly sombre edge to the usual blank emotionless faces sitting in silence. You could almost see the worried thoughts creeping into peoples minds after the events of the previous day. Although passengers were striving to display a stiff upper lip and not let the terrorists win, it was hard to ignore the events of yesterday and carry on as normal throughout the journey when there was a stark reminder of yesterday’s events staring back you from the front pages of the morning newspapers. The pages that usually fill people’s hands only served to fill the carriage full of the images of the chaos that ensued in a tunnel not unlike the one that we were currently encased in.

Every time the train slowed for the usual minor delays between stations there was a sense of apprehensiveness in the air. You could almost see the paranoia creeping into people’s minds as they wondered if this latest delay was a result of some sinister event further up the line.

On days like these it’s very hard to ignore the precariousness of a daily routine that involves willingly walking down into a tunnel that takes you some fifty metres underground with no immediate route to reach the daylight above.

The strange thing about it is that in reality the only thing that changed on my daily trip to work was my personal perception of the world around me. The trains still ran at the same speed. The other passengers were still their usual downcast glum expressionless selves. Everyone sat in silence without uttering a word to each other. And the newspapers still showed the usual headlines and pictures of death and destruction – it’s just that this time they weren’t covering events on the other side of the world, they was covering events much closer to home.

Above ground there seemed to be a similar sense of indefinable eeriness, though once again, it’s hard to tell if it’s really happening or if it’s just my own perception changing. The streets hadn’t suddenly emptied, people were still going about their daily business – but it was very quiet for a Friday. There was still the usual odd song of a siren echoing down the streets – they just seemed to be slightly more frequent. Life was going on as normal but there seems to be an ever so slight tension in the air. There wasn’t fire and chaos descending from above but you felt like in people’s minds that’s they wouldn’t have been entirely surprised nor perturbed if it did.

Overall though, there was no panic on the streets of London. There wasn’t even a minor annoyance at having the entire city disrupted for a day (it’s actually one of the first times I haven’t heard people complaining about the tube making them late). You almost sense that most Londoners accepted a major terrorist attack as only a matter of time and that now that the inevitable has come there is almost relief at the relatively minor destruction and disruption it caused, compared to 9/11 that is. The best indications of all were that the international cricket still went on at Lords and that the bars in the West End were still full that Friday night - normal service had resumed.

It might seem alien to little ol’ Aussie me, but in a city that still has fresh memories of the IRA terrorist bombings, let alone needing to be rebuilt after WWII, this isn’t such a novelty. Sure it’s not good, but the city has been preparing for this for a long time now. Londoners are well informed about the dangers of terrorism and have accepted it as part of day-to-day life. Although it may be worrying at times they won’t let the terrorists win. Life will go on and people won’t let fear affect their day to day actions. The stiff upper lip will prevail.