Mind the pants.
Hundreds of Londoners on Sunday afternoon headed down to the Underground, stripped down to their underwear and traveled around a bit, trying to look as though nothing unusual was going on.
As if.
Photo: Reuters
It was the “No Trousers Tube Ride,” an annual event with no point other than injecting a little levity into the bleak midwinter. No deep meaning, no bigger motive. The only goal was to be silly, if but for one afternoon.
“There’s so much bad, so much not fun going on,’’ said ringleader Dave Selkirk, a 40-year-old personal trainer. “It’s nice to do something just for the sake of it.”
After gathering at the entrance to Chinatown, dozens of clothing anarchists trooped through the icy streets to the Piccadilly Circus Underground Station in central London where they boarded their first train. The only hiccup was that the cars were so crowded some people could not shed their trousers.
Selfies were taken. Grins were exchanged. Tourists looked puzzled.
The first stunt in this vein was held in New York in 2002, the brainchild of local comedian Charlie Todd. His idea was this: It would be funny if someone walked onto a subway train in the middle of winter wearing hat, gloves, scarf — everything but pants? Or trousers as they are known in London, pants being synonymous with underpants in the UK.
“It would be unusual in New York, although you can see anything on our subway system, but what would really be funny is if at the next stop, a couple of minutes later, when the doors open and additional persons got on, not wearing trousers as well,” Todd told the BBC. “And they act like they don’t know each other, and they act like ... it’s no big deal and they just forgot their trousers.’’
The idea took off, and no pants days have been held in Berlin, Prague, Jerusalem, Warsaw and Washington, among other cities.
London hosted its first big reveal in 2009.
“You know, it’s meant to be a bit of harmless fun,’’ Todd said. “Certainly we are living in a climate where, you know, people like to have culture war fights. My rule in New York was always the goal of this event is to amuse other people, to give people a laugh. It’s not to be provocative, it’s not to irritate someone. So hopefully the spirit of that continues.”
Basil Long, a lawyer, showed up at the meeting point in a down coat and hat on a freezing winter afternoon, but after his journey underground in the warm tunnels of the tube, he had been transformed, wearing only a white shirt with bold rainbow stripes, pink underwear and Underground-themed socks.
“I just saw it online and I just thought: ‘Why not?’ It’s always a question, isn’t it,” he said. “When someone is asked why they climbed Everest, they were just like: ‘Why not?’”
Miriam Correa had a purpose.
The 43-year-old chef wanted to come because she had seen pictures of previous no-trouser rides that featured lots of thin, scantily clad women.
“I am a real woman,’ she said, adding that there was no reason to be ashamed of her shape. “All bodies are perfect.”
Indonesia was to sign an agreement to repatriate two British nationals, including a grandmother languishing on death row for drug-related crimes, an Indonesian government source said yesterday. “The practical arrangement will be signed today. The transfer will be done immediately after the technical side of the transfer is agreed,” the source said, identifying Lindsay Sandiford and 35-year-old Shahab Shahabadi as the people being transferred. Sandiford, a grandmother, was sentenced to death on the island of Bali in 2013 after she was convicted of trafficking drugs. Customs officers found cocaine worth an estimated US$2.14 million hidden in a false bottom in Sandiford’s suitcase when
CAUSE UNKNOWN: Weather and runway conditions were suitable for flight operations at the time of the accident, and no distress signal was sent, authorities said A cargo aircraft skidded off the runway into the sea at Hong Kong International Airport early yesterday, killing two ground crew in a patrol car, in one of the worst accidents in the airport’s 27-year history. The incident occurred at about 3:50am, when the plane is suspected to have lost control upon landing, veering off the runway and crashing through a fence, the Airport Authority Hong Kong said. The jet hit a security patrol car on the perimeter road outside the runway zone, which then fell into the water, it said in a statement. The four crew members on the plane, which
Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and its junior partner yesterday signed a coalition deal, paving the way for Sanae Takaichi to become the nation’s first female prime minister. The 11th-hour agreement with the Japan Innovation Party (JIP) came just a day before the lower house was due to vote on Takaichi’s appointment as the fifth prime minister in as many years. If she wins, she will take office the same day. “I’m very much looking forward to working with you on efforts to make Japan’s economy stronger, and to reshape Japan as a country that can be responsible for future generations,”
SEVEN-MINUTE HEIST: The masked thieves stole nine pieces of 19th-century jewelry, including a crown, which they dropped and damaged as they made their escape The hunt was on yesterday for the band of thieves who stole eight priceless royal pieces of jewelry from the Louvre Museum in the heart of Paris in broad daylight. Officials said a team of 60 investigators was working on the theory that the raid was planned and executed by an organized crime group. The heist reignited a row over a lack of security in France’s museums, with French Minister of Justice yesterday admitting to security flaws in protecting the Louvre. “What is certain is that we have failed, since people were able to park a furniture hoist in the middle of
RSS