Offensive pigeons

Etiquette is known to be a time-honoured virture proudly shared by the Brits, who, as I have been told since childhood, cannot hold a conversation without saying "Thanks (or cheers)" and "please", and cannot blame people without being apologetic. Despite this understanding that I was heading to "the United Kingdom of Courtesy", I couldn't help feeling delightfully surprised at the decorum I observed in everyday details.

The pigeons there, however, didn't seem to have the slightest share of such refinement. Numerically speaking, pigeons possibly surpass quite a lot of "raical minorities" in London as a humongous community. The horrid fact is that they are completely unabided by any cultural codes, which is, if you personify them, comparable to a mob which blatantly rules the streets.

One morning I was walking down to Green Park from Picadilly Circus, taking in the pleasant warmth from the rare sunlight, humming songs and imagining myself as some sort of male romantic lead in an artsy film. Suddenly, a giant flying object approached me at a velocity faster than I could decipher. Its flight aimed precisely at my head, as I expected an unfortunate collision with that intruder. There, before I could react more wittingly than freezing still, the object, which turned out to be a bird upon a 0.5m close-up, tore past me and slabbed my face with its wing. Oh yes - that pigeon SLABBED me. My knee-jerk reaction was to turn back at lightning speed, hoping to destroy the diabolical creature with my disapproving glare. It was, however and of course, futile.

Blatantly evil

Standing in the street and still recollecting my composure, I was a tad disoriented - should I be embarrassed or furious because of that abusive pegion? I know how ludicrous it sounds to you, but very seriously, failing to retaliate, even just with a glare or any forms of visual disgruntlements, was beyond frustrating. I do not remember those tiny sparrows in HK ever misbehaving in equal obnoxiousness!

In the rest of my days in London, I remained constantly vigilant against any suspicious avian terrorist attacks. Curious to know if I was the only unfortunate case, I told my friends this story. We then reached the agreement that pigeons in London are unabashedly aggressive, and should be sent to correctional camps.

Almost there. Hitchcock's _The Birds_