A modern Paddington Bear story
In this morning's metro:
The London that greeted Paddington Bear in 1958 is a far cry from that of today.
The small brown bear was found sitting on his suitcase with a note attached to his coat reading 'Please look after this bear', having been sent to England from Peru by his aunt. That would count as a plea for asylum these days and land him a place in a detention centre. At the very leat he would be likely to be ordered to spend six months in quarantine before the Brown family could take him home. Offering a pigeon a bite of his sandwich could land him with a £500 find in London. On the bright side, presuming he is a spectacled bear, the only bear species in Peru, he would then be taken to a zoo with a breeding programme as the species is threatened with extinction. If he was not a real bear, but in fact a teddy, Mr Brown would be required to tell station staff or police, and the station would be closed and poor bear blown up by a bomb disposal squad 'due to security'. If Mr Brown did get to bring him back to his Edwardian family home in Notting Hill, it would now be extremely expensive flats. In 1958, Paddington would have elevenses with Mr Gruber, an antique dealer on Portobello Road. If his shop had survived the sky-high rents of today, they'd now be more likely to grab a Starbucks coffee regularly interrupted by their mobiles. Halcyon days....
