London – My home town.
When I was living in Deptford and on the train into London Bridge most days – only 6 minutes, I passed what is now Bermondsey Spa. I watched the old 1960s flats being pulled down and would sing under my breath, Pete Seeger’s ‘Little Boxes..all made out of ticky tacky’ for that is what they looked like- cheap, thin walls – no more than high rise chicken coops unlike the Billions of £££s spent on the glass and steel edifices for the wealthy, probably only used as money laundering, assets to sit on …. etc. Homes worth many millions often empty – bought as an investment or used a few times a year, a second, third or fourth home.
I got priced out of my Home Town. But I still love her. Old London… I have not been feeling so chipper in the last few years. Appalling events like Grenfell, make me weep for the people and the place. Places that I have lived in, Born In Lewisham then across the River, my beloved River Thames, to North Kensington then Camden Tower Hamlets, in Southwark, down the road from Borough Market. Back south to Deptford. People I know are being caught up in all of this.
The young man living in that Tower Block Grenfell, 22 years old for fuck’s sake, escaping the War of Syria..trying to call his family to say goodbye.. well suck on that you, yes you, the Elite, you do not give a shit… when people have asked me where I am from..’London,’ ‘Oh Full of arseholes that place’, is an often given reply. Well, you diss London you diss most of the UK and the rest of the World – a City built on its River its Trade and its immigration… and when the Shit really hits the Fan they come to the fore, they the People – all of the people, with big hearts and minds and compassion and kindness.
I am seeing a young generation driven out: they cannot afford to live there anymore or pushed out to the edges. Then travelling into work is expensive. These are not the poor, the jobless, the disenfranchised, those that the Media and Politicians love to talk about. No, these are working people, lucky to have a job, but they cannot afford a home in the city they were born in. Cannot raise a family in it, play in it, enjoy it.
Establishment White
Power
Class
Entitlement – a right to rule
