Jon Pretty

I once had to catch a ferry to Ryde but by mistake got off at the wrong train station. As I wandered around outside, looking lost, a boy—I'd say about 12 years old—rode up to me on a bike. “May I help you, sir?” he asked. He was smoking a cigarette and wearing a tophat and tails.

It would be strange enough to be offered help so proactively, politely and precociously, but seeing this contradiction of a child in a car park behind Portsmouth & Southsea station kind of threw me. "May I be of some assistance to you, sir?" he asked again.

I remember feeling a sudden sense of stress as my British instincts kicked in and I thought to myself, "this is weird, but whatever you do, don't let on that you think it's weird". "Would you mind, awfully, directing me to the ferry port?" I said. He obliged, and that was that.