Life: My house is famous

(Jan 16 update: I just found a poster from one resident offering anybody $300 to take their place (lease) at Batavia Mews. Yikes! Not only is it unlivable, but we're trapped! And residents are paying other people to take their places!)

This week my flat, Batavia Mews, made the front of the London Student newspaper.

The story focuses on the mouse infestation that has run rampant through the flats for the last six or so months, and also discusses a couple other problems students have faced: electrocution (from faulty wiring) and dirty mattresses.

Here at flat 4, we have had a few of our own problems:

1. No heat until mid-October
2. Clogging sinks
3. Clogging shower drains
4. Three days in December (19th-22nd) with no heat or hot water - (meaning no showers and lots of cold, stinky flat-mates)
5. Loud cleaners (who come with friends and/or chat on their cell phones in the kitchens - right next to my room)
6. Broken cabinets (one in the kitchen just fell off its hinges over a week ago, yet to be fixed)

We also live right on a major thoroughfare, meaning people with rooms on one side of the house (with old, thin windows) hear traffic noises day and night - the traffic never really stops. And then their is the nightclub half a block away, providing a persistent 'thump, thump, thump' of bass on Friday and Saturday nights, and the heavy 'fire' doors that are rigged to slam shut - they have mechanical arms that are supposed to prevent this, but most of those are worn out, and the creaking hinges (I'm looking for WD-40) and stairs and paper-thin walls and floors.

Hmm... Is that all? I think so. I really don't like to complain, especially about somewhat trivial matters when so many people in the world have it so much worse and I should be spending time on loftier academic-type things. But, I'm afraid that conditions here have made other thought and work and relationships quite difficult.

A friend of mine, when I told him that London was draining me, commented that he thought a Buddhist could be happy anywhere. I suppose this is a common misconception, that we can somehow retreat from the world around us with meditation or chanting or some such thing. On the one hand, I could retreat inwards to some extent, focus on immediate tasks and cultivating calm and metta. I think I did this three years ago when I was in Bristol.

But going underground and inward for a bit is not always so easy with the "householder's" life. The struggle for balance is an almost daily one, between the solitary academic Buddhist and the community and family-oriented guy from Montana. Both sides love nature and silence, and both are far removed from these in Southeast London.

And I sigh, sitting in my room listening to the banging of utensils and cupboards in the kitchen - and sirens from streets below, looking out over a grey, blustery day in London.

Where is my mind?
Here?
In the kitchen?
Outside?
Watching over Kelly as she sleeps 4000 miles away?
Watching a summer sunset from my favorite perch near Missoula?
Where is my mind?
ha!