literally another aussie in london

Melbourne: Jaywalkin’ without an accent

Fucken jaywalking.

As if it’s a real thing.

I’m not a complete fucktard.  I check the road before walking out onto it, I’ve worked out that this is the most effective way of not dying.

That’s what I did yesterday.  On Collins St. I’d hit all my favourite pop culture nerd hang outs, had lunch with a mate, fixed my camera and was off to take photos of street art in my city of Melbourne.

But before I could do that I was stopped by a young pretty humourless police officer who wanted to know why I’d jaywalked.

“Did I?”

“Yes, you were the only person to walk before the green man appeared”.

“OK”.

“Well, why did you do it?”

“Probably because no cars were coming and I don’t live in a city where you’re fined for safely crossing a road”.

A month ago had I said this, I would have been fine.  A month ago most Australians treated me like I was a Pom.  My pronunciation of certain words was pommy enough to convince aussies I wasn’t one of them.

Now it’s a different story.  My Australian accent has returned, so much so that this police officer didn’t even believe I’d been living in the UK.  Then when I showed her my brand new Australia license (which I just got to hand in for a UK one when I returned to London) she definitely wasn’t buying my shit.

My shit was, rarely for me, completely true.

I now cross the road not completely automatically, but fairly close to it, far more than my Australian friends do.  And when traveling with my film crew, which were 2 poms, 2 aussies and myself, you could see the difference as the aussies often hung back.

This isn’t a hard and fast rule, my wife doesn’t cross in the UK, but in Melbourne people seem to cross the street less and less illegally with the thought they can be fined.

I’ve always thought fining people for jaywalking is a stupid thing to do.  People who get killed jaywalking are just proving that natural selection works.

I decided on not telling the police officer any of this.

On all three occasions when she asked why I’d done it, I informed her that I’d forgotten it was even a law here, I’d been living in London for years and if I don’t see any cars, I cross the road, as people all across the world do when not under fear of a fine.

You could see she didn’t believe me.

She took my details down so she could send me a fine in the mail, being careful not to say whether I’d been fined or not.

She did say that if the fine were sent, it would go to my Australian address, and I told her it would have to make it by Friday, as after that I’d be back in the UK and unable to pay it.

If I do get a fine for safely crossing a road when no cars were around, it was that comment in my recently refreshed Australian accent that will do it for me.

February 1, 2012 - Posted by Jrod | living in london | accents, jaywalking