Person to notify in case of emergency

My floor tutor, Helal, was going through my registration details for the Hall database. He was taken aback when he saw me robotically type my contact information and medical history and said “Wow, you’re too quick for this machine.” But my freak show came to a halt when I reached the field person to notify in case of emergency. In Manila, it has always been Ef. When I was in DC, it was my aunt. But here, I don’t know who that person is. Who is the first person that should care in the event I get sick, arrested, mugged or more appropriately, when I get hit by a double-decker when crossing the street?

It has been a month since I started living alone. I have no relatives in England, social circles were reduced to tabula rasa, and home is fifteen hours and £400 away. The only existing support system I have is an HSBC credit card that gets declined all the time because they have a different way of swiping credit cards here. Though I have met a couple of Filipinos who can be coerced to rice-binge in Chinatown, it just hit me how precarious it is to be in a city where no one is obliged to care. This sounds dramatic, but it’s like living in home for the aged, where biological maintenance is paid for, but emotional security is at the mercy of family and friends’ schedule as to when they can visit (or in my case, email).

At this point, the makeshift mechanism I can think of is not to get sick, arrested or mugged, and look both ways before crossing the street. That should make the detail person to notify in case of emergency less relevant.

Sharing photos from farewell parties. In the event I get sick, arrested, mugged and run over by a bus, you guys are obliged to care.