A day in Glasgow

The blazing sun radiated a sultry heat which was barely dispelled by a soft breeze.

The train sped along the River Clyde, through landscapes of  pasture field, broken here and there with jutting rocks; it sped past isolated farm houses, through green hills, dense patches of birch woodland, past Port Glasgow, past Langbank, past Paisley, past the subsequent suburbs of the city. It pierced through the industrial zone at the outskirt of Glasgow, a hodgepodge of factory outlet, warehouses, parking lots, ancient brownstone buildings with their fire escape contraptions covered with rust. Until It finally slowed down to a halt under the glass canopy of Glasgow Central.

It was the summer holiday and the railway station was at the peak of the afternoon rush. A dense crowd lingered on the main concourse, glancing at the Departure information board from time to time.

The Railway Station milled with activity. The main Concourse was  cramming with people who watched intently the Departure information board, raced to catch their train; travelers streamed from the platforms through the barriers, people reuniting with their love ones or who kissed and hugged goodbyes, whole families clustered around their luggage.

It was like an ever-changing microcosm of the human experience that was drowned in the loud noises of a busy station: announcements blasting from loudspeakers, trains which slid along platforms with a deafening rattle and roar.

I headed through the throng towards the exit and into Hope Street which was the scene of a frantic traffic. The lanes had become a congested torrent of buses, taxis, and cars of all sorts which spewed toxic fumes into the air.

I turned into Waterloo Street and strolled westward in the direction to the Hilton Hotel. The heat was almost unforgiving as a stillness possessed the air.

The afternoon was engaged in an appointment I had at the Hilton Hotel whose entrance was difficult for me to find as I was not familiar with the area. As I searched my way towards it, with a sense of annoyance and stress like a pain throbbing inside of me, the tall tower of glass and steel that reflected the blue sky seemed, at once, so close and so remote from my reach, like a mirage that mocked a traveler who had lost his way in a desert.

But find its entrance I finally did and I sighed with relief.

The appointment had however left me perplexed. I had been waiting in the hotel bar, a room that exuded luxury and the need to dazzle anyone with the sense of comfort that money provides, and I could not help feeling out-of-place with my cheap clothes and a sudden awkwardness that strung my nerves.

Offering my photographic services on a volunteering basis was not, I realized, devoid of pitfall. I had to navigate through the tiresome and treacherous domain of negotiations, trying to protect my work. Showing my work and getting the gig as a volunteer was the least of my worries, since this volunteering opportunity almost smacked of a commercial transaction.

I finally got outside the hotel. For a moment, I basked in the delightful warm breeze of mid afternoon and, then, strolled towards Sauchiehall Street which was just a few blocks from the Hilton.

I was expecting to see seething activity around the hip bars and restaurants. However, I realized that a large part of the street was closed, obstructed with steel barriers beyond which construction gear operated with loud noise, and the familiar stores were shut and inaccessible. There was a huge crane looming ominously over the place. An acrid smell of burning polluted the air; whether it originated from the recent fires that had recently flared up in the neighborhood, devastating a night club and the Glasgow school of art, or rising from the refurbishment been currently done, I had no idea.

I walked through parallel streets and narrow lane to reach the trunk of Sauchiehall Street that was unaffected, near where it started, at the top of Buchanan Street, right from the gate of the Buchanan Commercial Center, and where the crowd was dense, an ocean of faces constantly in motion.