Quoting @johnkonrad

The Financial Times “Big Read” this week is why London has lost its luster. Not one mention of Muslim immigration. Zero. It says “less safe” once. No mention of grime. London was once my favorite city then, just before BREXIT, I did a post about my stay in a fancy London hotel run by Italians. It was a disaster. Lost my reservation. Missed a wake up call. Then there was an actual fire and they evacuated the building but nobody called 911. I love Italy. Spent weeks there last year. But I don’t go for efficiency. I go for the food, museums, art, and the joy of getting lost down a winding street until time stops mattering. Here’s the thing. I’m in my late forties, had Rome been my favorite city in my twenties and thirties then I’d be a basket case right now. What absolutely pissed me off about the nice hotel was they completely missed the intent of my trip. I did not go to London for Aperol Spritz in a lobby designed by a gay man with a quirky sense of mediterranean elegance. I went for a wake up call from a hotel manager names Clive who travels to Greenwich observatory monthly to set his watch precisely from a John Harrison original. As @jockowillink writes, "Discipline Equals Freedom". Well the London of youth inculcated you in discipline and prescision! It taught you the importance of sacrifice for intellectual gain. The changing of the guard. The efficiency of Paddington Station I wanted. No sorry, I needed in my twenties a hotel manager who looked at the off balanced knot in my tie and grimaced. A Maître d'hôtel who would not let me in with scuffed shoes. Rules Standards Tradition And I needed a taxi driver who knew every corner of the city and could rant about small problems because he had driven the city for years with his eyes wide open. A man who got the job not because of his intellect or charm but because he had the discipline to memorize every ally and road to pass the test. I’m from New York City. You don’t come to NY to relax on a beach. You come to learn balancing situational awareness with alacrity. Many complain about the Americanization of the world but is that true? The great cities are turning into the boring block grey of Scandinavia, the arrogance of Paris, the relaxed attitude of Capri, the gay quirks of San Francisco. The well off and successful Millennials I know have the extra thick passports filled with stamps but every destination is a copy of the rest. Airports suck. Flights are exhausting. They take these quick jaunts around the world and they want familiarity because they are worn down. They need to relax. That’s not the purpose of travel! If you read Roosevelt or Churchill or Robert Louis Stevenson you will find out that travel was inspiring. Not relaxing. I love Jocko, I love the stoics, I love reading Joseph Conrad. Reading is a prerequisite for success. But inculcation is how the lessons of books gel in our mind. I owe a lot of my success to the inculcation of discipline, precision and self respect I gained in the London of my youth. But I learned nothing from visiting a British hotel run by Italians. And I learned little more than contempt visiting London last year. The solution? If they can’t or won’t stop migrants then the only solution is for Britain to colonize itself. It knows how to drive efficiency from a multicultural diaspora. This is something the British know how to do. Reject the millennial travelers and their wads of dollar bills. Attract travelers like the young me who want to be inspired by what makes you, you. Hold everyone every person who enters the City Of London on official business to a high British standard. You did it in Cairo, you did it in Bombay. You can do it in London too.