London's gone loopy but I love it

With only one week to go it's now time to taper, so my runs have been getting shorter. Last night I headed out on a balmy Friday night in North London, and within half an hour I witnessed the most surreal sequence of events...

I was running past the park and a massive RAT jumped in to my path! I screamed my head off, but instead of scaring it away it ran alongside me for what I swear must have been about 5 metres. Gross!

After that unwelcome encounter I turned the corner and right by the park entrance was a tent, a massive gathering of people and the sound of a Persian sorna and drums being played. 

A banner explained that the gathering was a peaceful demonstration raising awareness for Kurdish civil liberties. There were about 100 people gathered, and all the young people were doing these amazing traditional Kurdish dances, it was absolutely mesmerising, so I stayed to watch more. 

A nice old man explained the origins of the different dances. One was Turkish Kurdish, another Iranian and the third dance I saw was Iraqi - which is where he was from. Some dances were performed by men and women together, some separately - but all of them looked brilliant, and by the time I turned to leave there were a hundred more bystanders watching in amazement.

 

I know it sounds super corny but you couldn't help but feel really inspired, but I was quickly woken from my quiet elation as screaming sirens sounded from across the road. I thought it might be the police, but instead the sirens were sounding from a double decker bus, because there was a man standing with his chest to the front of the bus not letting it pass.  I have no idea what had happened, but cars were tooting, the driver was yelling and this guy just stayed there - chest to windscreen.

Eventually the guy let the bus pass, the demo re-started and I headed home. i couldn't have imagined a more surreal and fun night if I'd tried. Let's see what happens on my 8 miles today...

run like 'elle. x