I find it interesting as to why certain ethnic groups have congregated into different areas of London, turning the capital into a series of ‘villages’. You can understand the attraction once the pioneers have landed on a location, others near you are speaking your mother tongue, sharing cultural and religious values, and there is an abundance of ingredients to make your cultural dishes. But why these areas in the first place?
So today’s quiz is relatively easier than before, with the nickname of an area (sometimes derogatory, I’m afraid) you have to name the precise area of London and the group that at some time inhabited its environs.
Questions
1. Paddy Fields
2. Kangaroo Valley
3. Asia Minor
4. Korea Town
5. OK Yardie
6. Swone-one
7. Trustafarian Suburb
8. Italian Hill
9. Goldberg’s Green
10. Gantville Cowboys
Answers
1. Paddy Fields
They used to call it Ireland’s 33rd county. Kilburn went ‘green’ in the mid-20th century when Irish migration to north west London hit its peak. For the young men (typically) who came here to build roads and railways, this was a home from home. You couldn’t beat the emerald isle, but at least the High Road offered a substitute — lined as it was with pubs, dance halls, and other diversions designed to swallow up navvies’ earnings. Ian Dury named a band after it; and the IRA -it’s alleged – openly fundraised on it.
2. Kangaroo Valley
A former nickname for the Earl’s Court area on account of its popularity as a place to flat-share for Antipodeans spending a year or two while working in London. Popular in the 1960s to 1980s it had faded from use as Earl’s Court has become more heterogeneous. The area has also been known as the Polish Corridor.
3. Asia Minor
A snide nickname applied to Belgravia in the mid-19th century, on account of the large number of wealthy Jews who lived there, as a favoured area for retired military professionals with south Asian experience, who preferred fruits and vegetables redolent of their time abroad. By the mid-1880s it had transferred to Bayswater and Kensington.
4. Korea Town
With around 10,000 Korean residents living east of Kingston upon Thames, it has the largest and most concentrated Korean population in Europe. On explanation for the area’s popularity is that 1970s Korean expatriates followed the example of their ambassador and settle in Wimbledon, but when prices there rose excessively they decamped to nearby New Malden. Several local churches hold services in the Korean language.
5. OK Yardie
A nickname invented in the 1990s for a Sloane Ranger living in a multicultural and supposedly ‘edgy’ area such as Ladbroke Grove. The term is a blend of “OK, Yah” and “Yardie”.
6. Swone-one
Pronounced ‘swunwun’ in the 1970s and 1980s for Battersea, an area to which Sloane Rangers had recourse if they could not afford to live on the opposite side of the Thames. The area has also been referred to as South Chelsea, a nod to the diaspora from the more chic address.
7. Trustafarian Suburb
Notting Hill has been described as ‘London’s Trustafarian Suburb’, with its population if young, usually white, inhabitants who enjoy a bohemian lifestyle financed by a trust fund or other unearned income. The term was successfully imported into London from New York in the mid-1990s.
8. Italian Hill
Because I spent my first 6 years working here, this Italian enclave in Clerkenwell is my favourite of all of London’s villages. The strong Italian connections whose boundaries encompass Clerkenwell Road, Roseberry Avenue and Farringdon Road have lasted well over two centuries. The Processione della Madonna del Carmine, held on the Sunday after 16th July from the church of St. Peter’s has taken place every year, except wartime, since 1896. The Italian School was founded in 1841 in the street where I worked, and nearby there is even at Italian driving school the Scuola Guida Italiana.
9. Goldberg’s Green
Like our trade, this area of Golder’s Green has a large Jewish presence. This pun, once used by cabbies in the second half of the 20th century, may also refer to this wealthy area being ‘paved with gold’ and hence having an abundance of customers needing cabs.
10. Gantville Cowboys
Gants Hill, Newbury Park and Clayhall once had a large number of cabbies living in this area, far few nowadays with many going to the cab rank in the sky.
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Trivial Matter: London in 140 characters is taken from the daily Twitter feed @cabbieblog.
