Why drink bottled water when you have Thames?

One of the things that most Indians find both irritating and unnatural when visiting a restaurant or cafe in the UK is the fact they don’t offer water as soon as you arrive.

On a hot summer’s day the one thing that best beats the heat is a long cold glass of water, and unlike back home where waiters are good enough to bring it you immediately, here you have to ask for it.

Even then the waiters will try to sell you bottled water at exorbitant prices, and if you are like me and insist on just a glass of plain tap water, the waiter will look at you as if you are some cheapskate who should be thrown out of the restaurant immediately.

However this longstanding snobbery is about to change! Ministers and the UK’s biggest water provider are urging restaurants to routinely serve free tap water to their customers.

Thames Water authority is to take the lead against bottled mineral water concerned both about its cost and carbon footprint. “We are very proud of our water. It is 98.9 per cent compliant with very stringent targets making it the top quality in the country if not the world,” a spokeswoman for Thames Water told me. So why drink bottled water? Next time you are in town don’t be embarrassed and proudly ask for tap or Thames water!

For most young visitors to London, the Camden market is a pilgrimage that has to be made. Even if you don’t buy anything, the atmosphere of this trendy, young, ‘alternative’ venue at the Camden Lock in North London is great.

I have spent many Sunday afternoons in the summers of my youth just window shopping for bargains as well as celebrities. The Hawley Arms pub is the heart of the market and a haunt of celebrities including grammies-winner Amy Winehouse.

Sadly, a devastating fire on Saturday night burnt down a large section of the market and the Hawley Arms. Smoke hung heavy over the market this Sunday when I visited my old haunt to see the damage.

While no one had been hurt, over 100 stalls have been gutted. Many of the traders here are small businesses, do not have insurance and are due to lose everything. But their biggest worry is that major developers have been eyeing the area for some time and this may be the opportunity they have been waiting for.

“This is a quirky, rough-and-ready area and we don’t want big companies coming in,” said one of the traders still in shock. Police say it is too early to determine how the fire started, but if developers pounce on it then foul play cannot be ruled out.

It’s bad news for Krishna Omkar, the Indian student who hoped to stand for the Oxford Union presidency again. An Appellate Board has upheld the ruling and sentencing of an Election Tribunal that banned him for contesting any future elections at Oxford University.

Twenty-three year old Omkar was disqualified after his beaten opponent complained that he had won the election by indulging in electioneering — a strict no-no at Oxford.