North, South, East and West

A couple of weeks ago, my dad came to visit for the weekend. We packed a huge amount in to a couple of days. Highlights were:

* Curry in Brick Lane on Friday night (East End)

* Drinks in a City pub (City)

* Getting to the top of Parliament Hill on Hampstead Heath on Saturday morning (North London)

* Watching Fulham v Man Utd on Saturday afternoon (sadly not me, but dad and Kevin enjoyed it) (West London)

* Going on a boat trip along the Thames to the Dome (East End)

* Taking a trip on the London Eye (South Bank)

All in all, we covered a lot of ground and really got the sense of how different each part of London is - it's an amazing city.

Too cool for school

Last month we had a Camden-based weekend involving going to see a band on the Fri night and wandering round Camden market on the Sunday (before getting ever so slightly tipsy mid-afternoon!)

It's not often that I'm particularly self conscious about what I'm wearing or how I look but being in Camden on a Friday night was a bit of a test! We went to see Glasvegas, who have been tipped as one of the next big things. Having spent a fair amount of time in various music venues in my life, I'm used to turning up in jeans and a t-shirt and, well, enjoying the music. That didn't seem to be the point at KoKo in Camden. The phrase that came to mind was church of superficiality, epitomised by a girl I spotted wearing sunglasses (in a club, I mean come on!?). There wasn't a haircut in sight that hadn't been carefully angled and tweezed into that 'casually tousled' look and I don't think there was a single person there who actually let themselves relax for long enough to enjoy the band. All very entertaining in a bizarre kind of way. We ended the night in the wee small hours with an expensive trip home in a minicab!

I was running on the Saturday and then again, in a 10K race, on the Sunday morning (around Canary Wharf, which was beautiful and eerie). Then on the Sunday afternoon, because it was a beautiful crisp day, we decided to seek out some views. Primrose Hill had been mentioned to us, so we eagerly set off, hoping for a bit of a climb and a chance to see out across London.

Lovely as it was when we got there, it was clear that the definition of a "hill" is slightly different in London than in Edinburgh. When we say hill, we mean Arthur's Seat - i.e. a proper bloomin' hill, not just a bit of a mound...

The view across London was, well, alright, but a bit of an anti-climax I'm afraid. Anyway, we wandered through Primrose Hill, the area, and were amused to spot the former abode of Marx's comrade, Friedrich Engels. Nestled among the organic cafes, designer boutiques and exorbitantly priced flats that are home to the London glitterati, I wonder what he would have made of it!?

We ended up in Camden again, this time along Camden Lock and through Camden Market, which is a riot of colour and energy. Feeling slightly knackered after my running efforts I requested a pit stop for a small glass of wine... several hours later and feeling much rested, we rolled out of the pub and headed home.

Year of the rat

Yesterday was Chinese New Year – this year is the year of the rat. To mark the occasion, we went to China Town and caught the last few seconds of the last fireworks display in Leicester Square! We’d been out in greater London, visiting Kevin’s brother and his family, who live north of Hemel Hempstead – it’s still ‘London’ but only just. Much fun was had bouncing on Kevin’s niece’s trampoline, enjoying a roast chicken lunch and watching football on their massive TV.

Anyway, although we missed the Chinese fireworks, we did wander around Chinatown for a bit before getting cold and hungry and having a snack in “London’s only Hummus Bar”. Hmmm. Not sure I can see it taking off as a concept – you get a plate of hummus with a topping of your choice and a couple of pitas. Faintly interesting as a novelty but really, there’s only so much chickpea-based fun you can have.

On the subject of it being the year of the rat, the Observer yesterday reported that,

“Driven out of sewers by summer floods and an urban building boom, then nurtured by warmer winters and the leftovers of fast food, rats have been moving into homes, gardens and even cars around the country.”

Yuck.

Wombling around

There has been a run of glorious weather here over the last couple of weeks and it’s been getting steadily warmer, to the point that Saturday was actually T-shirt weather!

We had our usual list of weekend chores to do (sorting out bills, cleaning, tidying etc) but the day was too lovely to bother with any of that. So we decided to head for some green space and started to make our way to Richmond Park. The vagaries of the underground thwarted us though, as we realised when we got to Westminster that the particular branch of the particular line we needed was closed. As luck would have it, the other branch of said line went to Wimbledon so we decided to go to the Common and do some wombling instead.

Wimbledon is one of these bits of London that is unnervingly white and affluent. Our part of London is hardly ‘disadvantaged’ (stuffed olive with your sea-salt crusted, home baked bread infused with rosemary, anyone?) but it does at least have some diversity to it – which to me, is one of the most stimulating and enjoyable aspects of living in London. Wimbledon is very lovely to look at, and the Common is a fantastic space, but the overwhelming ‘mwa mwa yummy mumminess’ of it all just suffocates my spirit!! (sorry yummy mummies everywhere)

Living la vida social enterprise

Ended up out for a drink the other night with various people of a social enterprise leaning and found ourselves chatting to Ted and George, who have been involved in just about every bit of community development in and around the area we’re living. It was a privilege to talk to them and hear all about our local history.

The street we live in was one of the first initiatives between the community and the GLC back in the eighties. The land and buildings over a couple of acres were formerly the Courage brewery (our block was the office building) and they were redeveloped through a partnership between the council and the community into affordable social housing. Since then, there’s obviously been a bit of ‘right to buy’ leakage (presumably what has happened to the flat we’re living in) but the whole area remains one of the few centrally-located bits of social housing in London.

Round the corner from us is the Borough Market, a social enterprise which has been around for around thirty years and which brings hordes of middle class shoppers into the area every weekend. Our local pub is the Market Porter, which we were delighted to find out is actually owned by a local charity – guilt free drinking!

A few minutes along the Thames is the Oxo Tower Wharf, part of the Coin Street Community Builders development, which is more social housing (co-operatives and community-owned), combined with a whole set of bars, restaurants, boutique shops and galleries, again bringing money into the areas. We had dinner at the Oxo Tower 8th floor restaurant on Saturday night (thanks Kevin!), and I would highly recommend it for food (melt in the mouth flavours), wine and amazing views (see above for evidence!)

Democracy discussions

One of the perks of being self-employed is that I can make a unilateral decision to take Monday morning off if I want to. Having just got a load of work in last week, I’m taking advantage of the chance to do that just now - and it’s exactly what I did last week, spending the morning with my brother, Paul, who was visiting for a few days. We went on a boat trip up and down the Thames, followed by a wander around Westminster.

We had a lively discussion about human nature, liberal values, democracy and “the people”, whether rationality and happiness are mutually incompatible, and all kinds of related topics that I can’t remember now. As Paul said, it was good to be having that kind of discussion while walking around the Westminster corridors of power, instead of just taking pictures. But we did take a few pictures too – here’s one!

To run run run

Marathon training is going reasonably well and although I’ve not done as much as my original training plan says I should have done, it’s still much, much more than I’d done at this stage in 2004 when I ran my first marathon. So I’m feeling quite pleased with it all and am looking forward to the last 8 weeks of training before the big day in Paris on 6th April.

Running in London is a real joy – it’s flat, it’s not too windy, there’s loads of stimulation and it’s a great way to get to know how different bits of the city fit together. Yesterday I ran for about 2 hours (roughly 12-13 miles), following the Thames along to Chelsea Harbour and then turning back. This is what I run past:

The first few miles take me past Shakespeare’s Globe, the Tate Modern, the cultural bit of the South Bank (the National Theatre, the British Film Institute etc), the London Eye, the London Aquarium and the former GLC building (now a McDonalds!). This first bit is great when it’s fairly quiet, as it was yesterday (because for once I managed to get out early instead of procrastinating for hours!). When it’s busy with tourists it’s a nightmare and I’m sure I run twice as far, weaving in and out of the crowds – although it does mean I get to feel all smug and virtuous about being a ‘real’ Londoner (as if!).

Then I reach Westminster and as soon as I get past Westminster Bridge, it’s incredibly quiet. The stretch of the river past the Houses of Parliament is one of my favourite bits – such an amazing view. The next bridge is Lambeth Bridge and I normally cross over to the North at this point, then continue heading West along the Embankment towards Battersea and Chelsea. On the way I pass Battersea Power Station, an immense building and Battersea Park (which I avoid if I can because of the vast numbers of yappy little dogs, but which is handy for a loo stop if I need one!).

Then it’s on to Chelsea and through into Chelsea Harbour, through the grounds of the Conran hotel, past the Yacht Club and along the river again. I keep expecting to bump into Frank Lampard, John Terry or Ashley Cole - it has that footballer, loadsamoney feel to it! One of the yachts I saw yesterday was called “Hot Chihuahua”. I think that says it all!

Then it’s time to turn round and go back home again. The views, especially when it’s clear and sunny, are truly stunning. Not that I didn’t enjoy marathon training around Glasgow four years ago, but this is quite different!