by Howard Colyer
But Thomas Kowal was neither lunatic nor dirty. But the news of his lonely life on the Lee High Road had the power to unhinge my parents. And I went to the funeral. There were just the three of us – and one was dead. And the priest was glad to see me. [read more…]
Remembering Sea Alley by Mark Sadler
I grew up in a dockers’ terrace on Sea Alley, in East London. Our house was one from the end of the row, near to where the street split into three tributaries, like an old piece of frayed rope. A stone staircase ran along the front of the houses. When the water was at its highest point, it would come up over the third step, leaving the fourth step clear for you to walk on. [read more…]
by Matt Haynes
Out here, the river’s still allowed to undo its buttons twice a day and slob out across the mud with primordial glee. For one of the Thames’s more discombobulating quirks is that it’s wider upstream than down, where it’s been artificially banked and trammelled – no one paddles on the beach outside Lambeth Palace any more, not since Mr Bazalgette’s embankments went up in the 1860s and the Archbishop lost his deckchair concession. [read more…]
by Sno Flo
Spotting johns is easier. I see one in Ryman’s, buying pens. He’s fifty-odd, tall and bladder-bellied, with a sundae-swirl of fifties hair and a hot-pink polo shirt. Pink crocs too, the unsavoury bastard. I walk out. [read more…]
Sadly, despite all the hoo-ha, the internet never really caught on in Deptford…
[see more…]
by Matt Haynes
Despite, by law, occupying no more space than a horse and cart, each shelter could seat thirteen cabbies without recourse to contortionism or immodesty. An attendant sold simple hot fare, and the cabbies, in return, promised not to gamble, drink, swear or reveal how thirteen grown men could fit into such a small space and yet still go home to their wives without blushing. Not for nothing were windows frosted and moustaches kept trim. [read more…]
by Dale Lately
A “hip, funky, upbeat kind of stay” is how one online guide describes this distinctive London accommodation, and the shiny-eyed receptionist – barely out of her teens – gives you a hip, funky, upbeat kind of swipe card when you hand over a grubby twenty. Cell 14, she tells you. Sorry? She smiles. That’s what we call them. It’s part of the theme. [read more…]
by Jess Sully
A known introvert from a town with wide skies and a vast, shimmering expanse of sea, I didn’t think I’d be happy among the hemmed-in crowds. What I didn’t realise then is that within the anonymity of the ever-flowing throng, those shoals of fast-moving fish who swoop and turn as one entity, I could move silently, unobtrusive and unremarkable. And now I know, too, that sometimes at low tide the Thames smells of brine and seaweed. [read more…]
Chancellor George Osborne today refuted allegations that some of the most vulnerable members of society are beginning to suffer serious distress as a result of the spending cuts, and again insisted that we are all in this together… [see more…]
by Andrzej Ryan
Here in Brompton Cemetery, there are signs which forbid off-path wandering. Brompton is neat and tidy and intends to stay that way. But a waterproof-wearing rebel is creeping amongst the stones; bearded and bespectacled, he is carefully taking rubbings from the headstones. There are dog-walkers, cyclists and a pair of old men having a row. Two young women walk purposefully down a side path. [read more…]