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• There was an inevitability that there would at some stage be a terrorist attack on London, most likely at a time of the most political impact.  The terrorists certainly got that right.

  
  
  

  Do I detect a feeling that although the casualties are indeed horrendous, London has this time not been subjected to the full horror that the terrorists intended?

  
  
  

  An article like Jane's exemplifies what Londoners feel about threats from extremists. Excellent for morale.

  
  
  

  Well done.

  Christopher. 08 Jul 2005

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• Jane Carruthers has captured it.  As watched from the Midwest in America I saw many places where I had walked while seeking employment in the UK in 1998-1999 - Kings Cross, Moorgate, etc. Our support and condolences are with you all in the UK.

  My wife is British and although I could not find employment in the financial district in the City, I have no grudge against the British Isles. It is a wonderful place for Americans and I still have many friends there. God Bless the UK.

   

  Jane, to you thanks for capturing that awful day in writing - great writing and may this sort of terror never happen again - anywhere, UK or US or else!

  John 08 Jul 2005

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• I must compliment you on an excellent article 'A walk in the City'. It's truly terrible what happened yesterday, but the show of strength from London today is magnificent

  Daniel 08 Jul 2005

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• Jane,

  
  
  

  I read your article, which I thought was excellent.

  
  
  

  I was just east of Aldgate tube station when the bombs went off, heading for the City, and arrived a what must have been only few minutes after the Police roped it off. My first thought, of course, was simply to assume that it was yet another of those petty irritations that make commuting into London such a joy, and to thank the Lord, for the umpteenth time, that I use a motorbike so it would only add a few minutes to my journey.

  
  
  

  When I arrived at about 10am people were talking about bombs, and the sirens were sounding all over the place. Ambulances soon began to outnumber Police cars, and it became clear that something pretty major was going down.

  
  
  

  I suppose from there I did what thousands of others were doing at exactly the same time. First, I called my wife to tell her that I was OK, and not to worry when she saw the news. Then I logged on to the interweb, and gradually the full scale of what had happened became clear. Then I imagined being on one of those tube trains when the bang came and the lights went out, smelling the smoke and hearing the screams and expecting to see the flames coming down the compartment for me.

  
  
  

  Then I  got a coffee, did some work and went for a beer. The pub was hardly buzzing, but it wasn't that quiet, either. A group next to us comprised what looked like a couple of tenth generation London blokes in tee shirts and number 2 crops, a Sikh guy in a suit and a girl who looked Arabic. Only in London.  Theories of who was responsible were being discussed, people were saying how awful it all was but that life would go on.  Dreadful black humour abounded, with poor taste jokes to the fore. All this within a mile or two of where bodies, and parts of bodies, were lying on tube tracks.

  
  
  

  This wasn't callousness, or a desire to "carry on regardless". It was just human nature, and the fact that if you live or work in London you get used to the idea that it will happen sometime. You just expect it to happen to someone else, and this time it did.

  
  
  

  At least 50 people have been killed. Women who yesterday saw their husbands off to work, and who made breakfast and drove the children to school as on any other day, are widows today, their lives broken. Children are without a dad or mum and parents will be burying children. Many others are maimed or badly scarred.

  
  
  

  None of these people, or those who grieve for them, or who are now waiting numbly for news, were "crusaders", whatever that means to the inadequate, doomed nutters who set these bombs off. Even if they wanted to, they would have no way of giving the killers what they want, assuming that they want more simply than to kill for its own sake. If the people on those tube trains had any views at all on the Middle East, the treatment of Palestians by Israel, the Iraq war or whatever every one of them would believe in being fair, tolerant, decent. I bet that some of the victims marched against the Iraq war, and some were at Hyde Park, cheering as St Bob preached that the West, so despised by the terrorists, should do more for the poor of the world.

  
  
  

  They were just people like us, packed into a tube train, trying not to stare at the girl opposite, or work out 13 down, or wandering where to go on holiday, or thinking of a suitable way to dump their boyfriend. Then they were dead, or hurt, or terrified.

  
  
  

  Funny old world.

  Bill 08 Jul 2005

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• What happened has still not quite sunk in especially as Aldgate station is only a few minutes walk away from my office. Most of us were able to leave the office early. I walked from Fenchurch Street to Waterloo Station via Southwark Bridge.  There was little traffic apart from the constant stream of emergency service vehicles dashing along the Embankment. Waterloo had an eerie calm of normality with trains running to time. Guildford was different with as many Surrey police on the platforms as passengers asking how we were. A day never to forget.

  Alastair 08 Jul 2005

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• I was on my way to the office the morning of the attacks, when I left home I headed to Notting Hill to drop my car off for a service.  My plan was to leave the car and catch the tube to Bank Station.  As I drove to the garage I was thinking about things that now seem so trivial, when should I take my next trip to South East Asia, should I trade my car for a new one?  The events of the 7th of July have helped me to remember that ‘life is not a rehearsal’ – I need to do both, and a lot more.
  
  IC

  Ian 09 Jul 2005

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• I just read your contribution. Remembering my many visits of London from 1986 to 2003, I can only but agree that everybody who has a job in downtown London should walk along the streets whenever he feels like it. I did this all the time; sometimes during the day and also in the evenings.  Only by doing so could  I feel and look into the soul of that busy city!

  
  
  

  Often, I had to ask for the way; sometimes people did not even answer, were too absorbed by running after business and money; sometimes people were extremely helpful and friendly.

  
  
  

  Really, by walking, one can feel the pulse of a place, whether it is a sick, decadent one, or whether there still are wonderful people around: from my experience I can confirm that there still are many wonderful human beings around in that famous and wonderful City of London!

  
  
  

  Best wishes to you and all the Londoners from a Swiss friend.

  
  H.R.W

  Hans 18 Jul 2005

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• What strikes me about Jane's article is the difference between London and Madrid or New York. While in these latter cities, all was havoc for a day and government action was significantly altered in the following weeks, the London people and British government have demonstrated (again) a magnificent capacity to stand ground. You are probably right: this is part of the British culture and it dates from well before the Blitz.

  
  
  

  I think London will remain as a defeat for the terrorists. Media coverage was well organized (very few horror scenes), political impact was nil, impact on daily lives of normal citizen was low (especially in a city were public transport is SO unreliable) and the general feeling is that these events were just "another thing that happens" and the terrorists just another set of murderers  we should eliminate.

  
  
  

  P.G. (Paris)

  Philippe 20 Jul 2005

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