There was a bomb scare on my bus yesterday. We had stopped an unusually long time on Waterloo bridge when the driver came up to the top floor and asked 'Has anyone left a bag downstairs? Anyone?'. No one replied. He returned downstairs. There was a few seconds silence as everyone exchanged worried looks. Then, without saying anything, people began to leave the bus. I stayed in my seat. I don't know why. Perhaps it was just stubbornness, refusing to be like everybody else. But I also thought to myself 'Islamic terrorists don't leave bags. They carry them and kill themselves. The IRA would phone and tell the police where it was. It is highly unlikely to be a bomb.' And so I sat there as everyone left. Then the bus began to move again. A few minutes later it was my turn to get off, and, returning downstairs, I didn't see a bag. Somehow it had all been cleared off. Had someone forgotten they had a bag?
I left the bus and immediately was confronted by a similar situation. Waiting behind someone at a cash machine I was shocked when the person turned around and said 'Could you not stand so close please?'. I felt myself to be at a reasonable distance and so said 'Why?'. 'Because I don't like it. I don't like it' he said, and leaving the cash machine deliberately pushed into me. 'People usually stand over there' he added, indicating to a place only slightly further away and, in fact, at an angle to the machine so that they could easily see what PIN someone was typing. I couldn't do anything but laugh. It was absurd. It was 10:30 in the morning in Russel Square. Who was going to rob anybody?
What both incidents showed me, so close together, is the extraordinary amount of fear we live under at the moment. Is this new? Is there anything to be done about it? Is it being propagated by the government? I don't know. You decide.
