A busy day. I was up before 8, to collect extra baggage that had been shipped from Cape Town to Heathrow. I arrived by tube at Heathrow about 9:45, caught a bus to the Cargo company’s building. In the cargo compay's reception office, the TV was on: Westminster Abbey, laying the Queen mother to rest. They gave me paperwork to take over to Customs, a mile down the road. I walked over. But it was a decent day, bright and cold. I felt tired. I have not been breathing very well the last few days, maybe a bug, maybe the damp and dank air. I was back with more paperwork from customs by about half-past eleven.

Inside, the choir on the TV were singing hymns, and nobody was doing much, just standing around. This must be the two minutes silence. I sat down quietly. A tone sounded over the PA. A minute passed, another. In Westminster on TV, the service continued. Another tone sounded, and quietly the people began to move and talk again.

They were clearly not used to people showing up to collect baggage without a vehicle.

The only option to move by belongings was a taxi, to I requested a minicab – 42 pounds to get across town, less than I had feared. The cab turned out to be a Pakistani gentleman in a suit with a very nice Mercedes-Benz. “For chauffeuring” he explained in adequate English. It took two hours to drive across town. He avoided the funeral route. The car had a CPS/map/voice thingy, which told him where to go, but he often ignored it to chose a route that avoided the city centre. When he deviated from it’s chosen route it would say in a cut-n-paste female voice”make a U-turn as soon as possible”, and after a few minutes, adjust to our new position and start issuing directions forward again

I unpacked all the stuff, and crammed it into corners of my small room. Then on to my first face-to-face interview – shave, get into the suit. Rather be too formal than not formal enough. This is London, after all.

The interview went Ok, I thought I presented myself well, but I don’t have all the experience with ASP and Web pages that they wanted. Nine other people are being interviewed. Bah. I am not happy, but am persevering with this process.