its peckham, innit?

It has come to my attention (thanks mum) that I have not yet put up any pics of the area or house we moved into a few months ago. So I went trawling through my photos, only to find the ones I took of the house mysteriously gone. I doubt I deleted them, but suspect that they are probably hidden away in some random folder, to act as an example of what breastfeeding hormones do to your brain. Oh well. But what I do have is some photos of Peckham Rye Lane. The main street 100 yards away.

Perhaps I should explain better. Back in ye olde England times (16th century), Peckham was a relatively wealthy and influential area of london and by the 18th century Rye Lane was considered one of the major commercial roads of London, housing London's largest department store of hte day. However by the last century it had become an area synonomous with the cockney working class of london, some might remember it from that fine example of british comedy :Only Fools and Horses.

In the latter part of the 20th century, areas of Peckham were considered some of the worst residential areas in Europe. Urban decay, vandalism, graffiti, arson attacks, robberies and muggings were commonplace, and the area became an archetypal London sink estate. As a result, the area was earmarked for total regeneration in the late 1990s funded by the European Union.

Its a pretty interesting area of London to live. Definately what one would call a melting pot. On the one hand you have a large population of the traditional cockney english (now known as chavs), a HUGE population of Nigerians and Asian and an increasing population of relatively well-off people like Dave and myself who want affordable proper housing in central London (read: 3 bedrooms and a backyard). And it's all prettymuch divided up by the pretty amazing Peckham Rye Lane. On one side of lane you have all the estates nad 'affordable housing' and on the other side you have beautiful georgian and elizabethan terraced houses. Our house is about 100 metres from Rye Lane and although it is a disconcerting street where you feel like you might be in Nigeria rather than England - I absolutely love it cos there is a cinema, a library, a proper big supermarket, a train nad bus station and every type of store you could possibly need (from an Argos to a Primark to a Boots to a Woolworths). However if you head away from the lane towards the affluent suburbs of Dulwich and East Dulwich, you have yummy mummies pushing their prams to the organic store on Bellenden Road.


Below are some photos from Rye Lane. I'll take some of the other (much nicer) direction sometime soon. Oh - and you can't tell, but those snails were as big as my fist.