London Town

A hokey way of referring to London but also the most obvious WikiName for it. Note that this nomenclature is never, ever used in real life.

-- Except, well, we use that nomenclature every day here in London, and always have. Nice try though.

Only about six or seven years after writing the above I've realised that the most obvious WikiName would actually be "LondonEngland?". Oh well.

London is the capital city of England and of the UnitedKingdom, and home to a population of about 7.5 million. The wider metropolitan area has an approximate population of 12 million people (out of 60 million in the entire country). It's the former capital of the BritishEmpire, and thus the former CapitalOfTheWorld. Of course, non-Londoners believe that native Londoners still believe it is the CapitalOfTheWorld; this is the LondonCulturalAssumption.

Referred to as LondonVillage? by popular (Mancunian) radio DJs Mark and Lard, and their adherents, as a reaction to LondonCulturalAssumptions.

CityOfLondon is, of course, not the same. It is the original London approximately defined by the Roman WallOfLondon?. This contains the TowerOfLondon? and nearby is TowerBridge? over the RiverThames?. TowerBridge? is often confused with LondonBridge?, which does not have towers. Near to TowerBridge? is HmsBelfast?.

Also home to the ExtremeTuesdayClub.

London has its own wiki, the OpenGuideToLondon.

Home sweet home.

Or, "that great cesspool into which all the loungers and idlers of the Empire are irresistibly drained" - Dr. Watson in A Study In Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Famous for jellied eels (http://www.britannia.com/cooking/recipes/jelliedeels.html), CockNeys?, TheLambethWalk?, RhymingSlang, GoodOldKneesUpRoundTheOldJoanna?. Also, appallingly bad air quality, alienation, depression, shockingly inadequate and dangerous infrastructure, street crime, local government corruption on a grand scale, general filth and decay. Spectacular commuter-train pile-ups a speciality.

Now I think about it - how about a computer language based on RhymingSlang?

On the other hand, home to an astonishingly large number of good Indian restaurants. Also home to a huge number of museums featuring very obscure but fascinating things (for instance, the Worshipful Guild of Clockmakers - which has a phenomenal display of rare and historically significant clocks and watches and not one but TWO museums entirely devoted to tea.) Also home to one of the best public transportation systems in the world (and you have to travel the rest of the world to appreciate this).

Maybe so. Maybe not. When I was working in Manhattan a number of locals favourably compared the London Underground to the New York subway. I couldn't imagine what they were talking about, as I found the Subway throughout Manhattan and the Bronx much faster, cleaner more convenient and reliable than the Tube anywhere. And I'd much rather travel on a tram in almost any major European city that has them (maybe not Brussels) than a London Transport bus. Let's compare like with like: do the majority of large, rich, "western" cities have much worse public transport than London? Los Angeles is probably one, from what's said, but which others?

Only two? Not enough for the wonderful stuff...

I think Barcelona's system is better. -- TomAnderson

Nice place. I've been working on and off there for the past few months. What really strikes me is how different the people are there. Differences between British and American culture are endlessly fascinating to me. (See also the AmericanCulturalAssumption, BritishCulturalAssumption, LondonCulturalAssumption.)

He who is tired of London is tired of life, for there is in London all that life can afford. -- SamuelJohnson

: Yeah, but try to get pistachio flavored ice cream there.... (pistachio flavoured ice cream is available all over London, but for truly excellent ice cream, including pistachio, try Marine Ices in Camden, opposite Chalk Farm tube station.).

Any one read KenMacLeod? In his version of the future, things have changed a bit, but one of the most significant areas is called Norlonto or NorLonTo? (I forget) for North London Town... curious as the pattern (you call it hokey, but clearly you've seen it done before) of adding "town" onto London, where it comes from, etc.... -- BrianOneiromancer

LondonTown is an archaic expression - it immediately conjures up in the mind images of bad Victorian melodrama (and for me an early Judas Priest song about Jack the Ripper which I suspect SpinalTap? had previously rejected as too embarrassingly stupid.). LondonTown was also mentioned in the ridiculously cool Dire Straights song, Sultans of Swing and is no doubt a hang over from the many towns that were consumed by London as is sprawled into the home counties (Canning Town, Acton Town, Camden Town to name but a few).

Doesn't so much inspire Spinal Tap as Dire Straits, actually.

 You step inside but you don't see too many faces
 Coming in out of the rain to hear the jazz go down
 Too much competition too many places
 But not too many horns can make that sound
 Way on downsouth way on downsouth London town
     -- Dire Straits, Sultans of Swing

CategoryCity EnglandCountry UnitedKingdom