10. Overly Chatty Cabbies
In the North, you normally end up in a taxi when you've been to the pub and had a few too many pints of the brown stuff. When you're in a taxi in the north, your conversation with a taxi driver will consist of: Football How the driver's night is going What time they're on until Once those three subjects are exhausted, normally the ride results in the traditional awkward silence that befits such a journey. In London, taking a taxi/black cab is not just for the inebriated and getting a daytime cab can result in a cabbie who wants to waffle on about anything and everything. It's unnatural for a northerner to be that engaged with a taxi driver and more often than not, interest is feigned and a long wait in traffic becomes even longer.
9. Olympic Standard Umbrella Dodging
PixarWhen it rains in London, the umbrellas come out en masse, in force and usually, in your face. In the North, very few people bother with umbrellas we all feel that a little rain hurt nobody and just get on with it, but in London, the streets become a sea of different coloured brollies all seemingly at eye level. Unless you want to suddenly be blinded by an ignorant business person, you have dodge, duck, dip, dive and... dodge your way through the streets otherwise you'll inevitably be clocked by someone who isn't paying any attention to what's in their hand. It would seem that native Londoners are born with a natural sixth sense to keep them safe from umbrellas in their proximity, leaving us northerners in the firing line.
8. Feeling Like Everyone Is Talking To Themselves
ITVEveryone in London is either important, or feels like they're important and as a result, they conduct business meetings everywhere. EVERYWHERE. You can't walk down any street, through any park or even into an underground tube station without several corporate types having a meeting using their hands free kit, making it look like they're talking to themselves. Worse than that, though, is that to have a decent conversation on a hands free kit you have to talk quite loudly so essentially everyone in the vicinity is going to hear all about your business, which is just asking for trouble.