The Riotously-Homesick Traveller

With a departure date looming the anticipation is intensifying at an unnerving rate.

No, it isn't the beginning of an impending adventure whose supply of exhilaration leave me wetting myself. The Grand Canadian Hitchhike is drawing to a close, and my flight bound for London is a mere week away. Much I've missed the homely comforts of my flat, the freedom unbound by unpredictabilities of the road and lack of my own kitchen, and the cacophonous interior of the British pub surrounded by acquaintances and confidants.

My yearning for home isn't confined by secrecy: as much as I'm in love in Canada and proud to have successfully hitchhiked across it, I simply can't wait to leave Halifax.

But then my yearning was substantially magnified when news of the London riots reached my ears.

The remote observer

To be embroiled in riotous turmoil and strife is horrific and confounding enough – as I may testify having witnessed the Vancouver riots – but to observe grievances and violence unfolding in my hometown whilst situated on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean did more than sadden me.

It, for its minimal part, had me grappled for hours in a Starbucks, eyeballs strained and splayed from their sockets – as though shortening the distance between my pupils and the laptop monitor would bring me closer to the events back home. For hours I had reviewed, reproached and refreshed the web pages that tendered live updates, video footages and tweets from on-ground journalists.

The incredulity persisted when the looting spread like splatters of napalm rained down from the heavens.

Yet, it was tranquillity that surrounded me and inner peace that filled the patrons' hearts.

The spree of madness prevailed as I continued to watch my beloved London torched and burned. Stories of individual circumstances captured media attention and subsequently relayed to the Canadian maritime.

The House of Reeves, established in 1867 and even had its neighbouring street named after it – five generations, one spark and 45 minutes later the family business was reduced to ashes.

Footage of a bleeding teenager, apparently helped by a gang of youngsters only to be robbed of his possessions, emerged.

Young girls, appearing on BBC news, declaring the previous night's mayhem as "good fun", bloating about drinking bottles of rose – "free alcohol," they exclaimed in unison – at nine in the morning, rationalising their actions as a display to "show the police and the rich they can do what they want".

Vigilantes sprang up from communities all across London and riot-stricken cities – people's wish to defend their property and loved ones resonated when the sales of aluminium baseball bats rose by 24,000% on Amazon overnight.

This isn't the state of England I'd like to return to. For I have spent two months traversing Canada entirely reliant upon the generosity and hospitality of others and have, thus far, had my faith in humanity rekindled – arriving in London will be the grotesque reverse culture-shock no seeker of kindness deserve.

Frets, frustrations and futility

2500 miles away, there's hardly anything I could do – except condemning the cause-less revolt of the youth driven by pure greed.

My friend Sophie was among those who established #riotcleanup, a social-media initiative to rally Londoners to clear up their neighbourhoods in the aftermath of the chaos on Monday evening. I, for obvious reasons, could not attend the mass cleanup in Clapham Junction, a mere 30-minute walk away from my residence.

Neither could I swiftly get in touch with friends scattered all over London, urgently enquiring them of their welfare: several of them were stranded in the hearts of regions such as Clapham and Ealing – some of the areas worst-struck by the violence.

The sheer frustration had me wonder if I had been better off located right in the centre of action than futilely gazing at the screen among uninvolved and ignorant ears. Ifathomed the possibility of better sympathies, better companionship... rather than outsiders.

Maybe the severity of my home-sickness has been consistently augmented as seconds flew by – like the social problems chivvying the detonation that was the series of riots that took place.

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