I SUPPOSE we all know what London's like - full of tourists, crowded, noisy, smelly. A dangerous place, where youths carry guns and pickpockets jostle you. An unfriendly, rip-off city.

Walk around London with a toddler and it's transformed.

On the Underground, strong young men rush to help get the pushchair up steep flights of steps (ignoring old ladies struggling with massive suitcases, but no one's perfect). In shops, checkout assistants smile and chat. In the park, people keep stopping to talk. Over six months in London looking after my grandson, I met untold numbers of friendly people - some just the once, in passing, leaving only a warm glow behind; others more often, so that they became part of our lives.

There was the other grandmother, an elegant grey-haired lady with a grandson about Jonah's age. We'd meet near the fountains and compare notes on current infant routines and how they'd changed from the easy-going, child-centred days when our own children were babies.

There was the young mother, met as we pushed our charges on the swings, who introduced us to a toddler group and, later, invited my grandson to her little girl's first birthday party.

There was the Italian mamma, with her two teenage daughters, who came running across the street to coo over my grandson (and how he laid on the charm for them).

There was the lady with the little dog, who was delighted at Jonah's excitement over her pet and stayed chatting to us for ages about her family, now grown up.

There was the party of schoolchildren who got into our carriage on the

Underground. Normally, the enforced company of a bunch of boisterous teenagers would have been the last thing I wanted. But these teenagers gathered round the pushchair and kept Jonah happily entertained with games of 'Peep Bo!' till we reached our stop.

There were any number of people of all ages and sizes and colours with many different accents, tourists and students and retired people, who would pause on their way through the park to watch and smile as my grandson climbed on a seat or crawled on a rug on the grass or wandered in a daze of delight under the spring blossom.

Sometimes, I was given advice. There was the Frenchwoman who ticked me off one breezy day because Jonah wasn't wearing a hat. I smiled sweetly at her and went on my way. I didn't explain that Jonah always pulled off any hat you put on him or that, in any case, by North-East standards it was quite a warm day. She meant well, after all.

Then there was the old lady who came up to us as we waited to cross the road and, charmed by Jonah's smiles, exclaimed: "What a lovely little boy! You can tell he's loved." Then, just in case he wasn't loved enough, she added: "Mind you take care of him. Don't let any harm come to him." If ever any advice was unnecessary, that was.

One day I was pushing the buggy round the lake. Jonah was getting tired of just sitting, so I stopped by a park bench and lifted him out to clamber around - he was still only crawling then. After a moment or two, a man and a woman came strolling by. He smiled at them. They smiled back, then asked if we'd mind if they sat down on the bench beside us. We didn't, of course. In fact, Jonah revelled in their obvious admiration.

We got talking. They were about my age, from Taiwan, visiting England for their daughter's graduation. They were trying to see as many of the sights as they could while they were here. Delicately, they inquired if the baby was my son (it was pretty obvious that I was too old for that, but they weren't going to risk saying so, just in case). "He's my grandson," I told them.

"First grandson?" they asked, their faces lighting up. I said that he was.

"Lucky first grandson," they exclaimed. Then they asked if they could take a photo of each of them with us, by turns.

They could just have been thinking he made a charming picture. But I had a feeling there was more to it than that. Perhaps in Taiwan, first grandsons are considered especially fortunate, and can even bring good fortune themselves; a sort of good luck charm. But I didn't quite like to ask.

Once the photos were taken, they went on their way, and I returned the baby to his pushchair and continued our walk. One thing I do know - whether it's an ancient Taiwanese belief or not, a first grandson is certainly a good luck charm in the streets of London.

www.thisisthenortheast.co.uk

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