More or less all day today, three to six vehicles and a couple of uniformed platoons in Harrow Rd round the corner from my daughter's house in Kensal Rise where I am staying, clinging to the Smoke by my fingernails.
This evening saw the whole layout. They were pulling people quite near here, but 400 yards towards London, opposite one of my favourite pubs and outside the entrance to Kensal Green cemetery, there was an ANPR van parked facing the wrong way on the pavement with its lenses looking up the road towards Harrow. Quick radio, the car's pulled up near here. Four or five in the processing queue sometimes.
My old Trinidad friend met me for a drink in the pub there tonight. He said they'd been doing it all day long. My daughter thought there was a deeper layer, they were after terrorists. Damn well hope so, I said. No, she said, they were only pulling people of colour.
But earlier in the day, it didn't look like that to me at a cursory glance. Next time I'll look more carefully.
I so hate leaving London. Feel I'm geting out of touch already.
|
