Yonks ago in the middle ages, when the Romans ran amok in England building bath-houses, glorifying Gladiators and murdering masses of people under the banner of ‘The Crusades’, Spain was itself undergoing a transformation of kinds. At the bottom end of Spain lies the Mediterranean sea, and just across the pond, Morocco. It was then occupied by the so-called Moors, a misnomer for a mixture of peoples from Berbers to Iberian Muslims to Arabs.
When people think of London, they think London Eye, Big Ben and all your other normal touristy joints. When I think of London, I think of Whitechapel, amongst one of the dodgiest areas in London (Thats what people tell me!) that has played host to the most famous Whitechapeler of all, Jack the Ripper.
Perhaps this luminary cemented Whitechapel’s place as a ‘special’ part of town, but really, it is a diverse, multi-ethnic area of London where you have congregations of immigrants from all over the world. Yes, the streets are dangerous at night (Drunkards, drug addicts and pushers), but you could say that of any other street in the UK. Well, we lived in front of Sainsbury, right next to the IdeaStore and along the stretch of the famous Whitechapel ethnic day market across Royal London Hospital. Therefore, you could say it was in the safer part of WC that we went about our daily lives.
Besides having been the CENTRE of Britain’s H1N1 epidemic, this is also the home to the Bell Foundry, where Big Ben came from. These historical streets have seen everything from serial killers to mob hits and more recently, Chinese people touting pirated DVDs.
Brick Lane happens to be just down the road (20 mins walk) from Aldgate Station and is home to the famous Brick Lane market and the interesting shops that throng the area. I’d avoid the ‘curry mile’ of Indian restaurants serving up lip-smacking portions of ‘Chicken Diarrhea’, and head straight for them Beigels.
