« When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life, for there is in London all that life can afford. »
So said Dr Johnson, long before the days when anyone worried about personal pronouns. It’s our favourite city for much that reason. There’s a vitality, a vibrancy about London that is more than the sum of its parts. We’ve often gone to the theatre, though actually not since Covid. But will again. The parks are beautiful and London is more than a quarter green space. Some magnificent large parks but also hundreds of tiny ones tucked away. No concrete jungle here.
There’s history of course, from well before 1066. Parts of Roman London can still be seen. And that’s not the truly ancient bit. Excavations a few years ago when a new rail line was being put in uncovered bones from woolly mammoths! But more recently than that London was home to hunter gatherers and archaeologists working near Royal Oak tube station found bone fragments from reindeer and bison where 68,000 years ago the Westbourne River flowed through treeless meadows. So when people say the character of London has changed, they are, of course, right.
For some time we’ve been in love with Kilburn High Road. It’s changed too, although there are still pubs and shops that are proud to proclaim themselves Irish. Probably most typically now the street has a Middle East flavour but not just Middle East, with the mums in hijabs with babies in push chairs, the man on the corner playing the accordion, the street corner fruit and veg stalls - always cheaper and better than the supermarkets Its MP, Tulip Siddiq (Labour) “was raised a Muslim and has said that her ‘family embraced multicultural Britain’. In the heart of North London's Jewish community, she attended Seder with neighbours” [Wikipedia].
Already looking to book a place for a visit in October, somewhere near The Street.
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