Paulclem

A week last Saturday I took the early train with my kids and some of their friends to London for a Manga/ Anime convention at the Excel Building in Docklands. My two are into this Japanese comic/ animation form, and it does look quite interesting, though I have to admit I haven’t really read much.

So we had an uneventful trip down – I was reading and listening to my MP3, and the kids talked amongst themselves and texted each other constantly – as they do. The tube journey took about an hour to Custom House and passed without incident, though since landing at Euston station I had begun to notice groups of youths in rather garish attire.
I just assumed that it was London youth fashion until I saw a rather chunky Naruto lookalike in an orange suit and yellow wig striding along the platform at the last stop. And there was another, and a girl all in red, and a girl all in white with a very short mini. Suddenly our party began to stand out as more and more kids emerged from tube trains and tramped up the covered walkways to the Excel centre doors. The kids were in their element naming the various characters that we passed. Even I recognised Cloud and his Buster Sword from Final fantasy 7. The technical term for these fancy dressed kids are Cosplayers – presumably from Costume Players, though I will have to consult she who knows most of all – my teenaged daughter – about this.

My kids and their friends joined hundreds of others in the queue, and I sat at an open cafe in the concourse and watched some of the Manga world go by. I say some because it was like me, a 46 year old father, going to watch St. Trinians 2; somewhat unseemly. There were lots of young teenaged girls in skimpy Manga costumes about. So I buried my eyes in the Saturday Times and drank coffee.

The costumes were fascinating – when I felt it seemly to look- and the thousands of kids were tremendously well behaved. I saw no disputes, arguing, shouting – except in enthusiasm – fights, nothing that could distract them from their great shared enjoyment of the event. In fact the whole thing was like a mutual photocall with all the Cosplayers readily agreeing to be photographed with other kids. That seemed – to my uninitiated eye – to be the point. I have to say that if this is what my kids want to get up to – then that’s fine by me. It was all so good natured.

I had time to kill and books to read, but I also wanted to wander around this part of Docklands to see what it was like. I left the centre, with the kids still spending their cash, and had a look around.





It is fascinating to see new places and try to get a feel for them. There were lots of warehouse apartment developments with showrooms and flats both seemingly inhabited and empty. The centre of the development was a nice wide boulevard. There were some shops and restaurants, but as I left the thrilling, milling throng of excited kids behind, I realised that the place was essentially deserted.





I turned onto the waterfront to walk back past more pubs which were shut and apartment blocks that were eerily quiet. Yet it all looked pristine and new. I was a bit stumped. Where were all the people who should be getting in and out of their cars, walking dogs, going to the shops, lolling in the restaurants, or standing with beer outside the pubs? There simply weren’t any locals about.



I walked underneath the monumental cranes that stand along the dockside; former working machines that have a new static life as industrial art. They reached up past the apartments as the planes from the local airport zoomed up the Thames like great mantis, and I wondered if any of the flats had sold in this recession.



Walking back to the convention was like emerging from a solitary dream – there were voices again and suddenly Alien and Predator walked past me towards the local Nisa foodstore. Jack Sparrow was walking the other way, and so I think the shopkeeper was prepared and glad of such illustrious and voluminous custom.



Some re-enactments were being good-naturedly done as I strolled through the crowds. I saw the British and American flags being waved by a crowd of young kids in period costume. A group of about twenty were doing the Hokey-Kokey. Some pirates were running around in the distance. Noisy but nice.

A couple of hours later and my kids emerged unscathed and weapon-less from the main centre. I had read half of my historical novel, and tried to correct a poem into a sonnet whilst the couple next to me in the open cafe discussed how he’d been stabbed by a neighbour, and what he had said to the police. (The things you hear at cafe tables – but it does help to have a non-descript face like mine).

Tired and happy, we wended our weary way back through the tube to Euston and found a cafe in the station with chips as an option. It had been a complete success, but my wander around Docklands still left me puzzled.
A few days later, I discussed this with my friend who had lived in such places in London and agreed about the lack of community. It wasn’t that the flats hadn’t sold; they were inhabited in the week by workers unwilling to commute great distances to their respective hometowns. It all made sense. The cafes, pubs, shops and restaurants did their trade in the week, and the conventions at the Excel Building provided them with an ample weekend income. Solved!

It was funny to reflect though, that the kids, from all over the UK in their gaudy costumes, had provided a transient community of well behaved, enthusiastic, non-aggressive, fancy-dress party-goers for this temporarily empty corner of the capital. I wonder what the original dock workers would have made of it all.