25 Apr 07 The Spitz
If the Spitz gets the boot, what would be put in its place?
The neighbourhood is getting stranger every day. The Spitz is a local restaurant, gallery and music venue at Spitalfields Market that has been an institution for arts and culture for 12 years (though I can only speak for nearly 18 months of that time), and it’s now under threat of closure.
The facts are that The Spitz has been given six months notice to quit its current site in Old Spitalfields Market by its landlords Ballymore Properties. This means in a worst case scenario The Spitz would cease to exist by the end of September this year.
Currently there’s a Save the Spitz campaign underway, though few details are offered to explain what’s going on.
18 Apr 07 The journey
Travel is something I’ve developed patience for in London. Going places by tube can be time-consuming, but I no longer consider distance as a factor in deciding if I want to go someplace. If the tube stops near a destination then there’s no good excuse whatsoever not to go. I will happily, and now regularly do, travel across the city to meet someone or just go see something that I haven’t seen before.
Walking is also just a requirement of living in a large urban environment. A quick walk ‘around the corner’ might take 15 minutes, while a ‘long’ walk in the city is likely to take two hours or more. Walking a different way each time out is a fun way to discover such an intricately laid-out city, and to realise new things about what’s familiar in the well-trod routes. I appreciate seeing unexpected views of the architectural landscape from snickleways, and take pictures of them with my mind (or often in camera too).
Patience is easy to cultivate when you keep your eyes and mind open, with interest. The journey is the destination.
30 Mar 07 New Starbucks
As I mentioned in my last post, Starbucks has now opened a shop in Whitechapel Road. It really is quite a big deal, as indicated by the BBC.co.uk front page story today.
Protestors claim that the new Starbucks store on Whitechapel High Street will damage the East End’s unique character
They put these posters up on the storefront
meanwhile…
Tower Hamlets Councillor Ohid Ahmed, the Lead Member for Regeneration in the borough, said that the council wants to encourage regeneration by promoting outside investment from companies like Starbucks.
“This place is the heart of London and obviously we encourage more investment. We’re glad to see more investment coming into this area,” he said.
1 Feb 07 Urban Love
Recently I’ve been receiving emails from friends asking me, “So do you like it there?”
It has been over a year since we arrived here, and perhaps my “End of Year” summary didn’t quite get to the poetry of what’s going on.
Living in London has so many negative aspects, you could summarize a few of them if you skim the last couple of posts here. Just like New York City there are far too many tourists here, more than 20 million each year, which causes difficulty when you want to go about doing normal things like buying an iron, or clothing, or even groceries.
Living in any major urban center means you live in a chaotic universe that’s organic, always changing. Some days you want to vanish, while other days you want to give up the safety of your home and live in the buzz of the streets. That could just be me…
A day like today in London is a Royal Treat! It’s sunny and warm, but the days still begin to end around 3:00pm. The sun just doesn’t ride high enough.
But today I took a break from flat hunting to do some shopping in Covent Garden then decided against traveling home underground as I usually would. Weekends we would normally walk home (last weekend we walked the entirety of Zone 1), but today I rode home in the bottom of a double decker bus and enjoyed what is one of the best tourist rides going - from Trafalgar Square down the Strand and Fleet Street past St Pauls church, Tower of London, Tower Bridge and jumped out at home. The ride took 20 mins.
I didn’t have my camera today unfortunately, but enjoyed watching Londoners be, watching the city go.
Not many places in the western world can you ride past thousand-year old buildings to your doorstep in a jiffy.
I love London.
1 Dec 06 Shopping frenzy tomorrow
I’ve finished all my shopping for the season but I’ve got plans to enter the belly of the Beast tomorrow anyway.
The Beast? That is Oxford Street, where Londoners go do their core ‘high street’ shopping. That’s where the sidewalks (or ‘pavements’) are far too narrow to meet the demand of the throng of shoppers on any regular London day. Now that it’s Christmas shopping season, unless you aim to arrive between Monday and Wednesday early in the am and escape by tube before lunch, you just don’t want to be there. Sharp elbows or not.
Ideally the street would be closed to all vehicular traffic year-round - no taxis, no buses - as pedestrians currently push and pull too much for the average window shopper’s comfort.
Tomorrow has been branded Shop West End / VIP (Very Important Pedestrian) Day: for the first time ever the whole of Oxford Street, from Tottenham Court Road to Marble Arch, and Regent Street, from Piccadilly Circus past Oxford St, will be closed to traffic for “a day of entertainment and shopping” (from 10:30am-5:00pm). For those uncertain, that adds up to a few miles of busy, central road. Here’s the closure map (PDF), so come on down…
And forget the shopping - this is a street party! Last year Oxford Street alone was closed for a similar event and 500,000 people turned out :D
Really though, it’s a great opportunity to do some street photography with more ‘models’ turning out than usual. Also on the streets will be Santas and reindeer and brass bands and … beautiful lights strung across the streets every 30ish feet. Should be a good time!
Glad my shopping is done though.
4 Jun 06 On Becoming a Londoner
I have my first official sunburn from the London sun! Yesterday we enjoyed an entire day of full sunshine with temperatures around 24 degrees Celcius… woot! We started out the day visiting the first part of an eight week art and design show called Free Range at The Old Truman Brewery on Brick Lane. I’m looking forward to the Photography section starting June 15. Across the street was a designer fashions, samples and rejects sale that offered little more than a diversion - we didn’t leave with any purchases. Then we walked away the afternoon through Fitzrovia and around Regent’s Park and canal. The fields at the park were crowded with teams playing football (soccer), and following the canal presented an entirely different and stunning London experience. Who knew there was a ‘Little Venice’ in the center of London?
Today we’re headed to our first-ever boot sale, the Art Car Boot Fair, again on Brick Lane. I must reiterate how incredibly fun it is to live in this neighbourhood where cultural diversity is celebrated so well. We might even return with a piece or two of dandy local art :)
Some other indications I’m turning Londonese:
- Often when I say “a little bit” or “a lot” I omit the t’s
- When tourists stop me for directions I can guide them accurately
- I’ve considered responding to the question “Where are you from?” with “I’m from London (just speak with a Canadian accent by choice)”
- In my (sleeping) dreams I have two new boyfriends: this one and that one
4 May 06 Today’s headlines
“TUBE WILTS IN HEATWAVE”
Well 26 degrees Celsius, the first ‘warm’ day of the year, is called a heatwave here! For those in the US, that’s 77 degrees Fahrenheit.. This brings back memories of last summer in Ithaca NY where we had regular temperatures over 85 degrees F. In NYC I remember the temp hit 105F/40C. Now that is a heatwave! The thing with the tube is, though, there is absolutely no air conditioning and it is close to unbearable at this temperature, so ‘wilting’ is an accurate assessment. Before today I fully believed it would never get this warm in London, but I’m glad I’m wrong. It’s the first day I ventured out without a jacket… HEATWAVE!
The other news today is it’s local election day. Surprisingly enough since Matt and I are Commonwealth citizens and residents here, we are entitled to vote - we even registered and have polling cards. Unfortunately we haven’t done much research on candidates and the only issues affecting us thus far are recycling (non-existent) and health care (bureaucracy). This means we might not exercise our vote, but polls are open until 10PM so you never know. Over the past week we’ve been exposed to some old-school neighbourhood campaigning. Two different nights a double-decker party bus drove by our flat with a guy talking/rapping political schtuff over a PA, then last night on Brick lane there was a procession of cars with Liberal Democrat signs in their windows and the first car played some abrasive propoganda through a loudspeaker… in Bengali. Needless to say we couldn’t understand, but the Brick Lane locals didn’t seem to pay much attention. The voting power rippling off that street is immense in this district, I’m guessing.
3 May 06 Some fun events coming up
This week the Sultan’s Elephant is coming to town! Over four days the show travels through central London “in the area around Horse Guards Parade in St James’s Park, St James’s, Piccadilly, Haymarket and Trafalgar Square.” Thousands of people will be chasing this enormous elephant around, which should make for some fun photo opportunities. Surely Saturday at Trafalgar Square in particular will be mayhem. Here’s the timetable for the show’s whereabouts.
Coming up on Sunday the 14th is the Bangla New Year celebration “Baishakhi Mela” on Brick Lane. “Brick Lane itself will be pedestrianised throughout the day and transformed into a bustling market place with over 45 curry houses spilling out on to the pavement offering curry alfresco alongside 100’s of stalls giving a taste of Bangladesh through the wide range of Merchandise such as handicrafts and traditional Bangladeshi fashion wears.” All that goodness plus music, art and juggling clowns!
24 Apr 06 How to act British
There was a rather hilarious humour piece by Tim Dowling in the Guardian last week: For all my US pals - here’s how to act British (click to read, it’s short).
I definitely relate to his observation about the TO LET signs, it’s funny cause it’s true.
And here’s a noteworthy snippet:
In the UK overt displays of friendliness are taken as a sign of brain damage. This sounds horrible, but actually it’s a fairly good rule of thumb. Try to match your moroseness to those around you. Occasionally you will run across that rare British person who is not just friendly but outgoing, helpful, charming and loquacious. He is a con man.
Tee hee. I admit I was quite surprised the other day on the tube when I witnessed not one but two people offering help to a frantic tourist trying to understand the tube map. It seemed to me she had the capacity to figure it out on her own, what with the pile of city maps, guides and full tube map she was carrying. Both Londoners were outgoing and helpful, yes, but definitely not charming or loquacious.
I also hear if you tell someone to “Have a nice day” here it’s considered very strange.
2 Mar 06 First Impressions
Now that the moving clutter has dispersed and we have internet connectivity, it’s time to share some of my first London photos! Too bad there are none of the New Year’s parade which we saw bits of but were too spaced out from jetlag to properly enjoy…
Here’s the National Gallery at Trafalgar Square, which as you know is around the corner from where we stayed for the month of January:
I’d love to have rooftop access from any building overlooking the square as it’s often host to large gatherings, both planned and impromptu. Anyone know anyone who could help with this?
Take a look at my brief First Impressions slideshow (Flickr) for more. All of these were shot in January.
GET FED: 